


these days, i adore you (more and more)

by jeonhwa (seunghee)



Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-24
Updated: 2017-09-13
Packaged: 2018-12-06 06:11:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 21,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11594559
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seunghee/pseuds/jeonhwa
Summary: “Hmm, can I get a venti vanilla bean frap with two shots of espresso with whip and caramel drizzle on top?” The guy shoots him what must be a winning smile, except Seungkwan can’t tell, not really, because of that face mask covering his lips.“And your name is?” Seungkwan asks, his sharpie poised and ready.“Ver—” the guy starts, and then he stops. Seungkwan blinks at him, already having written down the first part of his name. “Hansol.”“Okay, Verhansol,” Seungkwan says, just a little bit confused, but he writes down the name anyway. Parents these days are getting more and more creative with their names, and, well, it’s not really his place to judge if someone’s name is what it is.(seungkwan isn't the best at remembering names, but he'll try to make an exception for his new favorite customer.)





	1. allegretto

**Author's Note:**

> inspired by the idea of oblivious barista seungkwan and shy actor hansol, as well as [this prompt](https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/comments/6h7ywr/wp_youve_been_dating_your_partner_for_six_months/)!
> 
>  
> 
> thank you, as always, to yun and juli for holding my hand throughout all of this~ i couldn't have done it without you! ♡

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _allegretto: a little lively_

Seungkwan doesn’t really care about keeping up with the latest celebrity gossip. It’s all just stupid and dumb and unnecessary, and he prefers to keep up with things that matter, like who currently calls the Blue House their home and exactly just what types of endangered canaries have been recently brought into the Seoul Grand Park. Celebrity gossip just doesn’t interest him in the least— after all, why would he care about the lives of people he doesn’t even know when there’s enough drama happening in his own circle of friends?

It’s why, when he’s halfway through a shift at Starbucks, he doesn’t understand why there’s a sudden tittering in the tables around the windows. It’s nearly noon, which means that nearly every single humanities major from Kyunghee University down the street is seated at a table with a Macbook and a sketchbook in front of them.

Hiding his phone back behind the counter, Seungkwan narrows his eyes at all of the girls suddenly craning their necks to stare at someone or something walking down the sidewalk.

The door opens, and a guy walks in. He’s very nearly _mobbed_  from the get go, with nearly every person in the coffee shop, girls and guys alike, rising from their seats, presumably to launch themselves at the guy. Seungkwan doesn’t get it. That guy looks like any regular guy, except most regular guys don’t have baseball caps pulled low over their foreheads and face masks covering their noses and mouths.

Maybe the reason people are following the guy around is just because he seems to have nice eyes. Maybe.

Then, like magic, the sea of people parts when two men, both tall while one is thin and lanky and the other is built and obviously muscled, appear on both sides of the guy with the cap and the face mask and escort him to the counter where Seungkwan is waiting. He hopes his jaw isn’t dropping too widely. That would be bad. Those must be some really good friends that the guy has, though, to offer to part the sea of Starbucks patrons just so their friend can get a drink.

“Hello, welcome to Starbucks, what can I get for you today?” Seungkwan says, already punching in what he thinks the guy is going to ring up. It’s happened at least a few times before, so it wouldn’t hurt to be right again. He looks to be about Seungkwan’s age, give or take one or two years, and if he’s going to order anything like what Seungkwan usually gets, it’ll be a—

“Hmm, can I get a venti vanilla bean frap with two shots of espresso with whip and caramel drizzle on top?” The guy shoots him what must be a winning smile, except Seungkwan can’t tell, not really, because of that face mask covering his lips.

Seungkwan looks down at where he’d punched in a grande iced americano with no ice and less sugar, then back up again at the guy’s face, and wonders if he’s misheard. But he knows that in his nearly three years of working at the Starbucks nearest his college campus, he’s had ample time and more to perfect his listening skills, and he _knows_  that he hasn’t misheard. Okay. A venti vanilla bean frap with two shots and whip and caramel on top. Got it.

He clears the order that he’d already made and reaches for a cup to write down the order onto, and when he’s done writing down all the abbreviations on the side, he looks back up again at the guy.

“And your name is?” Seungkwan asks, his sharpie poised and ready.

“Ver—” the guy starts, and then he stops. Seungkwan blinks at him, already having written down the first part of his name. “Hansol.”

“Okay, Verhansol,” Seungkwan says, just a little bit confused, but he writes down the name anyway. Parents these days are getting more and more creative with their names, and, well, it’s not really his place to judge if someone’s name is what it is. He takes the guy’s card and runs it through before handing it back. “Your drink will be ready in just a sec. We’ll call your name when it’s ready.”

Seungkwan smiles at Verhansol, one of those nice and placid smiles that his mom’s friends always like to coo at, which then never fails to lead to them pinching his cheeks until he can almost feel them starting to get flattened out. Then he motions for the next customer in line to come forward.

“Wait,” Verhansol says, but Seungkwan doesn’t hear him— he’s already taking the next guy’s order. Oh well, Seungkwan thinks, as he writes down the order for a tall caramel macchiato with five shots. If Verhansol has any problems with his name, it’s not Seungkwan he should be taking it up with— it’s his own parents.

 

* * *

 

When Seungkwan gets home, lugging his bags of groceries up two flights of stairs and tromping all the way down the long hallway, he pulls out his keys to unlock the door when he realizes that it’s already wide open. He groans, a long-suffering groan that he hopes will induce the earth to swallow him up.

“What the _fuck_ , Soonyoung-hyung?” he shouts, pushing the door open with his hip and dropping his bags in the entryway. It’s a small apartment, one that’s situated a few blocks away from campus, but a short distance is what he’d had to sacrifice for cheaper rent.

“Sorry!” He hears from the general direction of the bedroom that’s not his, so he follows the direction of the noise.

“You guys decent?” Seungkwan asks before nudging the door open with his elbow, and he hears an indignant squawk in return. Seungkwan leans against the door and folds his arms over his chest. Ah, there they are. The usual culprits.

Seokmin, his roommate of five— nearly six, then they’ll have been roommates for longer than Seungkwan’s old hamster Bongie had been alive— years is sprawled out on top of the bed in the middle of the room. He’s flipping idly through some brochures that he’d picked up at the law office he interns at, and he looks up and waves when Seungkwan narrows his eyes at them.

Soonyoung, Seokmin’s friend from one of Seokmin’s classes, is sprawled out on top of Seokmin’s back, scrolling through his phone. He’s a part-time bartender and a full-time couch surfer, and he’s also the proud owner of the annoying squawk from before that had apparently come out of a human mouth.

“Why did you guys leave the door open again?” Seungkwan grouses. “This is, like, the fifth time this has happened in the last two months, can you guys not? What’s so important that you can’t just, I don’t know, _lock the door behind you_?”

Seokmin, at least, has the decency to look ashamed. Soonyoung doesn’t.

“Important things,” Soonyoung declares, with a grin that’s entirely more suited for a bar than the sacred and holy ground of Seungkwan’s apartment.

“We’ll remember in the future, it’s just that _this guy_  was so into something he was reading on his phone that he forgot to lock it behind him.” Seokmin reaches behind him to slap Soonyoung on the arm. “Get your bony ass off of me, Kwon Soonyoung, jeez.”

“Fine,” Seungkwan huffs. “What was so interesting that you nearly sacrificed the safety of our beloved home territory for?”

Soonyoung perks up. “Oh! Do you guys remember Wonwoo, that one friend of mine? The one from elementary school?”

Seungkwan doesn’t remember the specifics, just very general details, and he can tell that Seokmin doesn’t, either. They both nod, though; otherwise, Soonyoung’s going to launch into an hour-long spiel about how much he loves to hate Jeon Wonwoo and how much fun they’re going to have at their next paintball session.

“So he got hired to be a manager for this one actor from overseas, it’s so cool, he was telling me _all_  about it, like how that actor dude gets the total VIP treatment and stuff even though he’s even younger than I am. Man, I wish I were rich. And talented. And hot,” Soonyoung sighs wistfully, deflating a little before he perks up again. “Wonwoo mentioned that he’s filming for some movie right now, though, so he might be able to score us tickets to go see it when it finally comes out?”

“Nah, I’m good,” Seungkwan says, already inching back towards the hallway so he can rescue his groceries and put them back into the fridge.

“Are you sure? It’s some guy who used to be a child actor but now that he’s all grown up and hot or whatever, they want him to be in this blockbuster movie. Vernon Choi? I think?” Soonyoung practically jumps up, entirely too animated for the current topic of conversation. “Come _on_ , it’ll be fun! I promise!”

“I’m good, seriously,” Seungkwan says. The name does ring a bit of a bell, but the bell isn’t ringing quite enough that he bothers to pay attention.

“Jeju Island bumpkin,” Soonyoung mutters, flopping back down onto the bed, and Seokmin lets out an extremely loud “ow, fuck _dammit_ ” when Soonyoung puts too much weight onto Seokmin’s arm.

“Seoul city stuck up,” Seungkwan sneers without any real malice behind it at all. It’s all fun and games between them, the casual jabbing and playfulness that only come with years of being friends.

He’s trying to remember where he might’ve heard that name before, but then he realizes that he doesn’t have time for this. He has so many other things to worry about, anyway, like— “Wait, did you remember to tell me if Son Dambi was on that music show earlier today?”

“You asked me that?” Soonyoung’s eyes are too wide for him to be completely innocent. Seungkwan wasn’t born yesterday; he knows how Kwon Soonyoung operates.

“I wrote it on the _whiteboard_!” Seungkwan screeches, and he can practically feel his blood pressure rising. His doctor told him during his last visit to keep his blood pressure down, but honestly, it’s just _so difficult_ when he lives with people like Seokmin and Soonyoung.

“Just kidding,” Soonyoung says, rolling over to grab a pillow and toss it up to the ceiling. “Yeah, she was on it. It started at half past four, just check the timestamps I left on the notepad on the table if you wanna just watch her cuts.”

“The timestamps that _I_ wrote down and the notepad that _I_ left on the table, thank you very much,” Seokmin pipes up. “You were just eating the mozzarella cheese sticks that I got earlier today.”

“True,” Soonyoung agrees, but Seungkwan doesn’t care. His heart is swelling up with an unidentifiable emotion, and it isn’t long before he can feel himself starting to burst.

“I love you guys,” Seungkwan chokes out, and it’s the only warning that Seokmin and Soonyoung get before Seungkwan launches himself at them, landing squarely on top of Soonyoung’s legs and Seokmin’s back. “I love you guys so so _so_ much.”

“Okay,” Soonyoung gurgles out, but Seungkwan just hugs his head even harder. “Can you get off now— please— can’t— breathe—”

 

* * *

 

Seungkwan’s a year out from school. He’d gone to school for musical theater, but now he thinks he wants to be a variety star or a singer. Or something. He’ll figure it out. It’s definitely not what his parents had planned for him, but he’s happy to keep working to save up money so he can put it towards what he’ll do later on.

He started out as a barista for Starbucks after he finished his second year of university, and while it’s not the greatest job, it pays the bills and lets him have a good amount of time off if he ever wants to go back to Jeju to visit his parents, provided, of course, he can find someone to take his shifts for him.

He’s been at the local branch for long enough that he’s become an assistant manager, and while it pays more than just being a barista, the hours are definitely worse since he doesn’t have it in him to force the already overworked university students to help him open before dawn even breaks and then close up at the end of the day. It’s why he’s usually at the shop until late, dusting off the tables and cleaning up any errant spills on the ground.

It’s why, when someone pushes open the door at nearly five minutes before closing, Seungkwan starts at the sudden sound, nearly toppling over an open carton of half and half milk. It’s really empty, with just one other girl packing up her laptop into her messenger bag and getting ready to leave. It’s why Seungkwan nearly stares at the guy who walks in before remembering that he’s supposed to be doing his job.

“Hello, welcome to Starbucks, what can I get for you today?” Seungkwan asks, practiced and easy. When he blinks, he realizes that this guy is the same guy who’d come in a few days ago— the guy with the baseball cap and the face mask.

“Um,” the guy says, and he sneaks a look around the shop before he tugs the face mask down. Seungkwan barely represses a snort. It’s like the guy thinks he’s searching for _danger_  or something like that— who does he even think he is? The only other person who’d been there, the girl with the laptop and the bag, has already left, the bells above the door tinkling in her wake.

“What happened to your friends from last time?” Seungkwan asks, idly drumming his fingernails on the table. If he has a few minutes before closing left, he might as well make it worth his time and have it be fun.

“Friends?” the guy echoes, a blank expression coming over his face, and Seungkwan squints at him.

Now that Seungkwan has the chance to actually look at his face without the shadow of the cap and the face mask covering it all, he can admit that it’s a pretty nice face. His nose is high and his cheekbones are sharp and well-defined and his eyes are framed with long lashes. Dirty blond hair sweeps across his forehead, and there’s the beginnings of a dusty pink flush starting to creep across his cheeks due to the blustery chill of the night air outside.

He shakes himself mentally. Snap out of it, Boo Seungkwan.

“Yeah, the two guys? One was tall and kinda tan? And the other was a bit shorter? They helped make way for you when you came in last time?” Seungkwan asks, and he sees recognition start to dawn in the guy’s eyes. He resists the urge to snort. Seriously, exactly what kind of friend is this guy, if he doesn’t even know who Seungkwan’s talking about?

“Ah, yeah,” the guy mumbles. He shifts, fidgeting with his own fingers. “Well, they’re just… off doing their own things right now. You know? I just like being alone sometimes, I guess.”

Seungkwan hums. “What are you, famous?”

“Um,” the guy starts, his eyes suddenly wide. “Er—”

“Just kidding,” Seungkwan laughs. Like this guy is famous. He’s too awkward to be a celebrity, all of his gangly limbs and uncoordinated movements clearly too _normal_ to belong to someone famous. The commotion that started up the first time he came around was probably just because of his admittedly stunning eyes. “Of course I know the answer. Anyway, what’ll it be for you today? You have, like, a minute to decide.”

Seungkwan squints at the guy even more. He thinks he might need some new glasses, what with all of the squinting he’s been doing, but no matter. What was his order again? He usually doesn’t remember the orders, not when he goes through hundreds, even thousands, a week, but sometimes, there are the unusual cases, where the owner has an unusual name and an unusual order.

It hits him.

“Ah! You were the vanilla bean frap with the whip and caramel and the shots!” Seungkwan squints a little bit harder. A name’s just on the tip of his tongue, something that sounds _different_. “Verhansol?”

The guy winces. “Yeah, uh—”

“So, Verhansol, what’ll it be for you today?” Seungkwan asks, cheerily now that he’s remembered a name. “The same thing?”

“Actually, my name isn’t Verhansol—” Verhansol says, and Seungkwan pauses.

“It’s not?” He’s a little disappointed, if he’s going to be honest here.

“Yeah, it’s just— Hansol. Just Hansol here,” the guy says, and there’s a strange sort of relief in his voice when he says that.

“Just Hansol?” Seungkwan asks, and the guy nods. “Alright, Hansol, what would you like? We’re technically kind of already closed, but I guess it doesn’t hurt to whip something up for you real fast.”

“Oh, I didn’t realize, I’m sorry, I’ll just—” Hansol says, his eyes wide. He’s halfway to lifting his mask back over his mouth so he can, presumably, run away, but Seungkwan reaches over the counter to place a hand on Hansol’s wrist.

“Hey, it’s fine. What’s one more cup to clean, right?” Seungkwan offers what he hopes is a reassuring smile, and he feels a warm rush of _something_ when he sees Hansol hesitantly smile back.

“Er, alright, then. What would you recommend? Uh, my voice has been kinda scratchy lately, so I think it might be something wrong with my throat? Anything that could help with this which would be easy to clean up?” Hansol asks, and Seungkwan takes a moment to consider it.

“Wait here,” he says to Hansol before bustling behind the counter to brew his tea. He’d normally recommend a warmer drink when it’s so cold out anyway, and hearing that Hansol’s throat hurts makes him lean toward getting him a hot herbal tea. Hansol looks like a peach tranquility kind of guy, if he’s going to be real honest with himself.

Hansol is still there when Seungkwan comes back with the drink, popping a lid onto the cup and sliding a thin sleeve up over it. He places the cup between them, looking down just briefly to make sure the lid is on tight, and when he looks up, there’s a card in his face.

“Here,” Hansol says as Seungkwan takes it. “I can pay for however much that was.”

Seungkwan almost considers giving it to him on the house, but— well. Money doesn’t grow on trees. He does reach down to the pastry display to pull out a cake pop, and with one hand still holding the card, Seungkwan holds the cake pop out to Hansol with the other hand.

“Cake pop? I promise they’re good. Kinda sugary, but you ordered a vanilla bean frap the last time around, so i don’t think you have any problems with sugar.” Seungkwan grins as Hansol takes the cake pop, leaving him free to run the card through. “It’s on the house, by the way.”

“Oh, are you sure? I can cover it, it’s no big deal.” Hansol says, signing the receipt that Seungkwan slides over the counter. “I’m sorry, I feel shitty for making you stay behind so long after closing.”

Seungkwan shakes his head. “It’s fine, really. At least you didn’t make me whip up something super complicated.”

Hansol doesn’t look convinced. “Are you sure? I can help you if you need it— like, anything?”

Seungkwan _does_  end up laughing then. “Oh my god, are you serious? Nah, it’s seriously okay. Besides, I’d have such an issue with the higher-ups if word ever got out that I let a customer wash the dishes. We do have cameras up in here.”

“Oh. Well. Thanks a lot for this drink,” Hansol says, tucking his card back in his wallet before shoving it all unceremoniously into his pocket. He lifts up the cake pop with one hand and the drink in the other. “Thanks a lot— oh, wait. What’s your name again?”

Hansol leans forward to read the name on Seungkwan’s tag, and the drink very nearly tips over, except he rights it in time. “Seungkwan. It’s been great meeting you, Seungkwan. Thanks for waiting so long for me.”

“No problem,” Seungkwan says, feeling the beginnings of a smile tug at his lips again. “Come back whenever.”

Hansol grins at him, lifting up the cake pop again in some kind of a salute, before he turns on his heel and walks back out into the night. Seungkwan watches him go.

He cleans up in almost record time that day, and even though he gets home later than he usually does because he’d left later, his mood doesn’t drop at all. Even when he flips on the lights in the hallway to see Soonyoung with his legs stretched up over the other end of the couch, watching some old Running Man reruns and stuffing cheese puffs into his mouth and getting crumbs everywhere.

It’s annoying, but it’s always been the kind of annoying that’s the familiar and welcoming type of annoying. He thinks that if Soonyoung _hadn’t_  been there doing that, he’d be even more weirded out. So Seungkwan just grins slightly and makes his way down the hallway to go shower and then collapse into bed for as long as he can.

“Hey, shorty, why so late tonight,” Soonyoung calls out from the couch, and Seungkwan doesn’t even bother flipping him off, which makes Soonyoung nearly tumble to the ground in shock. He manages to catch himself on the edge of the couch in time, hanging off of it for a few seconds before giving in to gravity and falling anyway. “Wait, what the fuck, I called you short and you’re not even responding? Hey, Boo Seungkwan, who are you? What’s wrong with you? Hey!”

Seungkwan trudges down the hallway, beelining for his bed instead, and he collapses face first onto his sheets. He breathes in, and even over Soonyoung’s shrieks telling Seokmin to _get up, someone’s abducted Seungkwan and replaced him with a super nice lookalike!_ , Seungkwan can still hear the beating of his own heart.

He wonders just why he remembers so, so clearly the fact that Hansol hadn’t pulled his face mask up before he left, leaving his entire smile, wide and beaming, open for the entire world to see.

He wonders just why he cares.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi hi everyone :'') i think... we all know what's up with hansol haha i think everyone knows except for our little boo~ chapters will be posted every monday, and please let me know if there are any issues with the formatting or anything else! (also, full disclosure: i've never worked in a starbucks, only in a bubble tea shop, so i figured it would be kinda similar. please tell me if i've botched any important details up!) thank youu ♡


	2. scherzando

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _scherzando: playfully_

Hansol comes to the Starbucks again. It’s very nearly the same thing as what happened the last time, except for two things: the first, it’s ten minutes before closing this time around, and the second, he brings his friends with him.

“Hey, Hansol,” Seungkwan says, resting his elbows on the counter. He hadn’t had to open up today, which is probably the only reason he’s as unusually awake as he is right now. His foot starts tapping out an insistent rhythm against the linoleum floor, _tap tap tap_ , and he hopes that no one notices. “Oh, hi, your friends are here today. Hey!”

One of the guys, the one who’s a bit shorter than the other, nudges Hansol in the side, and Hansol winces. “Uh, yeah. They wanted to meet you.”

The guy nudges Hansol again, and it seems to be harder than before, since Hansol winces more widely than the last time. “This is Seungcheol,” Hansol says, smacking the guy’s wrist away. He gestures to the other guy, the taller and tanner one. “This is Mingyu. They’re both annoying.”

“You must be Seungkwan,” Seungcheol says, and as he comes a little bit closer, Seungkwan can’t help but feel that this situation is a bit like a predator honing in on its prey. He gulps. “Hansol couldn’t stop talking about you, God, so annoying.”

From behind Seungcheol’s shoulder, Seungkwan can see Hansol roll his eyes nearly all the way to the ceiling. “I have _not_ , stop spreading lies, seriously—”

“Anyway,” Seungcheol starts, smoothly cutting Hansol off in the middle of his sentence. “We wanted to see where he’s been spending all of his time. He even ran away from us last night, can you believe it?”

“Seungcheol-hyung, please—” Hansol says, his eyes suddenly bigger than usual, taking a step forward and grabbing at Seungcheol’s sleeve. “Wait, hang on, seriously, this isn’t what we agreed to—”

“ _Anyway_ ,” Seungcheol says again, easily shrugging Hansol off and sidestepping him. “It’s good to meet you. We’ve heard a lot.” He smiles. “If this kid ever gives you any trouble, just let me know, yeah?”

“Er, yeah, of course, but Hansol hasn’t really done anything wrong,” Seungkwan says, and he hesitates for just a split second before he continues in a tone that he hopes makes clear that it’s all a joke. “I mean, aside from coming here five minutes before closing last time.”

Hansol, at least, has the decency to look a little mortified, and Mingyu, behind him, stifles a laugh.

“I’m sorry,” Hansol says quickly, and when he shoves Seungcheol to the side so that he can stand in front of the counter, that’s when Seungkwan realizes that he’d come in without a face mask entirely. He looks down, and he sees that it’s dangling by its strings from Hansol’s hand. “I just wanted to catch you when—”

He cuts himself off, and Seungkwan doesn’t know why his throat is suddenly too tight, or why his mouth is suddenly too dry, or why he can’t form words that had come so easily to him before.

“When what?” Seungkwan asks, and he thinks that his voice is much, much calmer than how he feels. There’s no real rational explanation for why he can hear his blood thundering in his ears, but his palms are sweaty and all he can hear is the beating of his heart.

“When you were alone,” Hansol says, so quietly that it’s almost a whisper, so quietly that there’s no way Mingyu and Seungcheol can hear them unless they have superhuman senses. He inches forward slowly until the only thing separating them is the counter between them— small mercies, Seungkwan thinks. Small mercies.

“And why would you want to do that?” Seungkwan clenches his fists, his nails digging into his palms the way he knows will leave white crescent moons in his skin later on.

It’s so quiet, so still, that Seungkwan swears that he could hear a pin drop. Somewhere in the back of his mind, a voice reminds him that they’re not alone, that Hansol’s two friends are still there, but it’s hard to register their presence when he’s having enough trouble remembering that he has to stay standing, has to stay upright, has to stay _breathing_.

“Because,” Hansol says, his eyes fixed on Seungkwan’s, like they're the only two people in the entire store. “I wanted to talk to you.”

 

* * *

 

“I’m ruined,” Seungkwan says empathically, throwing open the door of Seokmin’s room. Soonyoung’s currently camped out in the middle of Seokmin’s bed, reviewing some of his dance videos on a tablet, while Seokmin’s sitting on the ground, his back against the side of the bed. Seungkwan beelines for the bed, toppling as dramatically as he can onto the bed, and Soonyoung included, as he can.

“What the fuck,” Soonyoung says, even more emphatically. He swats at Seungkwan’s arm, which Seungkwan dodges neatly only to flop over onto Soonyoung’s chest. “Why are you ruined. Get off, I’m trying to review some of my choreo.”

“Soonyoungie-hyung,” Seungkwan whines, rubbing his cheek against Soonyoung’s t-shirt. “My life is _over._ ”

Soonyoung sighs and puts his tablet aside. “What’s wrong?”

Seungkwan sighs louder than Soonyoung had, reaching upwards so he can scratch at Soonyoung’s shirt as Soonyoung reaches down to tangle his fingers into Seungkwan’s hair. “I think I caught something,” Seungkwan sniffs, and he feels the bed dip as Seokmin gets up onto the bed as well, laying his head against Soonyoung's.

“Are you sick?” Soonyoung sounds far too concerned for Seungkwan’s comfort, toeing the line between Kwon Soonyoung, professional couch surfer, and Kwon Soonyoung, an actual good friend, and Seungkwan stifles a giggle.

“ _Nooo_ ,” Seungkwan draws out for as long as he can. He sighs again, even longer and more drawn out. “I’ve caught the _feelings_.”

There’s a still, still silence in the room, one that’s punctuated only by Seokmin’s shrill giggle, before Soonyoung, in a quick movement, pushes Seungkwan off of him and onto the ground.

 

* * *

 

“Hyung,” Seungkwan moans through the door, clawing at the handle that is, unfortunately, very stoutly refusing to budge.

“No,” Soonyoung calls out.

“ _Hyung_ ,” Seungkwan says again. “Let me in.”

“No,” Soonyoung replies again. “Deal with your feelings yourself, you giant blond marshmallow.”

“ _Soonyoungie-hyung_ ,” Seungkwan whines. “I really need help. Please, hyung.” He says, more quietly, “I don’t know what to do.”

The door opens, and Soonyoung stands there, his arms folded over his chest. His mouth is pressed into a thin line, one that’s clearly borne out of his annoyance with Seungkwan’s persistent antics, but it softens as soon as he sees how large and clearly pleading Seungkwan’s eyes are. Or maybe that’s just Seungkwan projecting, but whatever, he’s gotten his foot in the door, and he’s not budging. Soonyoung is going to listen to him whether he likes it or not.

“Okay, kiddo. Let’s talk about your feelings,” Soonyoung sighs, and drags Seungkwan over to the bed. “Who’s this about?”

“Well, there’s this one customer,” Seungkwan starts, before Soonyoung stops him with two fingers expertly placed over Seungkwan’s lips.

“A _customer_? I thought you said most of them are annoying.”

“Well, yeah, I did, but I said _most_ , not all. Hyung, stop interrupting, I’m trying to tell you about my feelings, okay? These are really weird feelings, so I’m gonna need you two to listen hard so you can figure out what’s wrong with this dude,” Seungkwan huffs, his voice slightly muffled until Soonyoung removes his hand.

“Anyway. He came in one day, right? And I thought he was some kinda crazy dude because he had this hat pulled down over his face and a mask, too, like he was trying to be a celebrity or something.”

“That’s it?” Soonyoung asks, his eyebrows arched. Seungkwan hates that about him, by the way. His eyebrows are always so nicely done, whereas Seungkwan’s grow into untamed messes after a few weeks of not maintaining them. But that’s beside the point right now.

“No, of course that’s not it,” Seungkwan snaps. “Hyung, aren’t you even listening? He came in with some stupid dumb really long order the first time around, but then when he came back, he asked me if _I_ had any recommendations for what he wanted to drink. Who even _does that_?”

“Uh, a lot of people do? Once they realize that the drink they got the first time because their coworker’s sister’s friend’s cousin said it was a good one ended up sucking? People tend to ask baristas if they have any recommendations,” Soonyoung says, his eyebrows arching even further into his hairline. Seungkwan thinks that if they go up any higher, they might disappear.

Seungkwan shakes his head. “No, you don’t understand. He wants something, hyung. Tonight, when he came in for the third time, I asked him why he came so late, and guess what he said!”

“What,” Soonyoung says flatly.

“He said,” and Seungkwan looks around the room even though there’s nothing else in the room besides Seokmin, who’s sitting on the edge of the bed, apparently transfixed by Seungkwan’s story. He continues, in his most dramatic stage whisper, “that he wanted to talk to me.”

“So?” Soonyoung asks. “I want to talk to you sometimes, too. How is that any different from what he said to you?”

“It’s _totally_  different,” Seungkwan argues. “First off, you’re just my roommate. Housemate. Doesn’t pay rent but still sleeps over here all the time guy. Whatever. You’re not _him_.”

“What makes me so different, then?” Soonyoung asks, and then Seungkwan realizes that there are so many ways that they’re different. Hansol and Soonyoung are like two sides of a coin, completely polar opposites, and he needs to make Soonyoung understand.

“Well, he’s really good looking, and he has a nice voice, and he looks at me in a kind of funny way,” Seungkwan says, pleased with his answer.

“By that kind of funny way, what do you mean?” Soonyoung’s eyes are piercing, his gaze steady, and Seungkwan fidgets. It’s strange seeing Soonyoung like this, so immensely focused, when the Soonyoung he’s used to cracks jokes nearly every hour of the day and makes jokes at Seungkwan’s expense whenever he can.

“Like… it feels like he’s just staring at me and me only? And it makes me feel super weird, too. My heart starts beating really fast, and my hands get sweaty,” Seungkwan lists out, and then he bolts upright. His jaw slackens, and he grabs at Soonyoung’s upper arms. Oh, hey, he’s been working out. “Hyung, am I— am I _sick_? Am I going to _die_?”

Soonyoung rolls his eyes. “I think I figured out what’s wrong with you, Seungkwannie. Just one more question, though. Or maybe two, depending on just how dense you are.”

“What is it?” Seungkwan asks, nearly biting his nails in anticipation.

“It happened today, right? What did you do after he said he wanted to see you?”

Seungkwan’s mind goes blank. It had just happened that day, but for some reason, he’s drawing a blank about what had happened after Hansol had leaned over the counter and said, in that deep voice of his, “Because I wanted to talk to you.”

He remembers the blood rushing through his ears, so loud that Seungkwan couldn’t hear his own thoughts. He remembers his palms loosening, falling slack at his sides. He remembers suddenly feeling so, so dizzy, and he remembers slumping over the counter, and— oh. He remembers Hansol reaching over the counter to steady him, his hands warm on Seungkwan’s arms. They’d been so firm, holding Seungkwan in place so that he couldn’t fall anymore.

He remembers Hansol’s voice asking him, “Seungkwan? Seungkwan! Are you okay? Seungkwan!” The shock and the near desperation in his voice were both unmistakable, both unforgettable. He remembers telling Hansol that “I’m fine, Hansol, really. Um, I’m just a bit lightheaded. Yeah. I’m okay. Thanks,” and it had been a complete and total lie, since Seungkwan had felt anything but fine at the moment.

He remembers the way Hansol had offered to make one of his friends drive him home that night after he’d finished cleaning up for the night. “There’s no way I’m letting you walk home alone this late at night, especially when that just happened,” Hansol had said, a deep furrow between his brows.

He remembers saying “Oh,” in a _totally_  intelligent and well-spoken manner, and who was he to argue, when Hansol was right there next to him, so kind and so nice to someone he’d only met three times before.

He remembers giving the tall one— was it Seungcheol or was it Mingyu?— his address, stammering over the familiar numbers and characters like it was his first time saying them out loud. He remembers sitting there in the back seat with Hansol, their thighs pressed together, the warmth of Hansol’s body next to his permeating the limited space between them.

He remembers Hansol walking him to his door, and he remembers Hansol asking him, “Do you have your keys?” And he remembers nodding his head yes in return, and he remembers—

He remembers Hansol staring at him in the dim light of the overhead lights, his eyes reflecting the stars and the moon in the sky, so luminous and so incredibly bright. He remembers Hansol’s breath hitching so noticeably anyone could’ve seen it from a kilometer away, his throat bobbing and his Adam’s apple moving up and down.

He remembers Hansol saying, “See you again, Seungkwan,” so fondly and so warmly that he had felt the same way he always felt when he wrapped a warm towel around himself.

He’d walked nearly robotically to his door, trying every single key in his keyring before getting to the one that finally worked, before stumbling through the hallway and trying to gather his thoughts. He’d ended up there, in front of Seokmin’s door, declaring, “I’m ruined,” before opening the door and throwing himself down on Soonyoung.

But what had come before? What had come before all of that— that was Soonyoung’s question, after all, and he thinks he knows the answer. There’s only one real logical explanation for how he’d slumped over the counter and made Hansol have to shake him, for how he’d suddenly just lost all control over his limbs and thoughts, for how he still doesn’t quite remember exactly what had happened in the moment itself.

“Oh,” Seungkwan says, horror creeping into his voice. “I think I fainted on him. Just a little bit. Oh god.”

“Oh,” Soonyoung says, delight evident in every word he says, “Seungkwannie, I think I most definitely know what’s wrong with you.”

“I don’t want to know,” Seungkwan says as quickly as he can, as he starts to connect the dots of just why Soonyoung is so excited. “I don’t wanna know, I don’t wanna know, I don’t wanna—”

“You like him, Seungkwannie,” Soonyoung and Seokmin chorus, altogether too happy for Seungkwan’s liking. “You really, really, really like him. You _like_ him.”

“Fuck,” Seungkwan says, staring blankly into nothing at all, and then he says, once more, with added emphasis, “ _Fuck._ ”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :3c seungkwanie is so cute


	3. pianissimo

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _pianissimo: very gently_

The next time Hansol comes by, Seungkwan is ready, and by ready, he means that he’s in the back of the store, huddling morosely next to the freezer in the kitchen and picking at his nails. He’s not hiding, of course; hiding would imply that he has something to hide, which he doesn’t. Of course.

So when the manager on duty, Jeonghan, pushes open the door of the kitchen to lean against it and raises his eyebrow— a talent that Seungkwan wishes he had, to be quite honest with himself— Seungkwan turns in the stool that he’s appropriated as his chair and faces away from him.

“What are you doing?” Jeonghan asks, and by the tone of his voice, Seungkwan can tell that it’s his “I’m pretending to be a responsible manager” voice. Seungkwan hates it because Jeonghan is almost always right. “Why are you hiding?”

“I’m not hiding,” Seungkwan says, reading the sheet of paper stuck on the freezer. “Hey, this is interesting. Did you know that we’re low on frozen strawberries and blueberries? Someone should make the order to refill them.”

He hears the sound of footsteps, then before he knows it, his chair is being spun around and Jeonghan is leaning over him, his eyes searching for _something_ in Seungkwan’s face.

“Don’t pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about,” Jeonghan says sweetly, his voice like melted sugar. “Boo Seungkwan, you’re going to tell me why you’re in the kitchen talking about strawberries and blueberries and hiding on a stool like a little kid when there’s a customer at the counter asking where you are.”

Seungkwan nearly falls backward off of his stool in shock, and he just barely manages to catch himself on the side of the table next to him. “What?”

“Oh, now _that’s_ suspicious,” Jeonghan says, leaning down even more, his body nearly folded in half at this point. “Who’s this? An ex?”

Seungkwan gulps. He’s always felt that there is nothing scarier in the world than Yoon Jeonghan when he’s on the war path, and now he knows for sure that he’d rather swim the distance from Seoul to Jeju than have to spend twenty-four hours with Jeonghan when he’s like this.

“Or,” Jeonghan continues, righting himself again and pushing stray locks of dyed blond hair behind his ear. “Maybe he’s a new beau coming to woo you? Do you like him?”

Several things happen in quick succession.

First, Seungkwan shrieks, absurdly high-pitched, and he bats his hands at Jeonghan to try to get him away because he just can’t deal with this right now.

Second, Jeonghan stumbles backwards, bumping into the table behind him— the table that has their drink ingredients and other food items laid out on top of it.

Third— and both Seungkwan and Jeonghan watch this happen in slow motion, their hearts leaping into their chests— an open carton of half and half milk teeters over the side of the table and falls with a completely anticlimactic splat onto the ground, its contents spilling everywhere.

They stare at the mess that’s slowly growing outwards, the white puddle expanding until it touches the soles of Jeonghan’s shoes and the legs of the stool that Seungkwan’s perched on and continuing even further like it’s looking for more things to make milky and disgusting.

Seungkwan stares up at Jeonghan, his hands shaking and his mouth working, but no words are coming out of his throat. He says, higher than he’s ever heard his voice before, “Jeonghan-hyung, I—”

Jeonghan takes a slow and measured breath. “Boo Seungkwan,” he says, finally, eerily still. “I’m going to go outside. I’m going to tell your lover boy out there that you’re busy and you can’t see him today. I’ll be back in five minutes. And by the time I get back, this mess is going to be gone and you’re going to be done acting like a lovesick baby.”

Jeonghan picks a napkin off of the table, and with something akin to disgust, wipes the milk off of his shoes and tosses it into the garbage can before he turns on his heel to go back out front. Seungkwan remembers, with an additional pang of guilt, that those are the shoes that Jeonghan had just bought last week. Oops.

It’s only when he’s wiping up the mess and tossing the empty carton, along with all of the paper towels he’d used, into the garbage that he really starts to process what Jeonghan had said.

“Lover boy, my ass,” Seungkwan mutters under his breath as he cleans his hands off so he can go back out front. “He’s not my lover boy, that’s for sure.”

 

* * *

 

The next day, when he has his next closing shift, Seungkwan waits at the counter with a cake pop saved in the display for Hansol as an apology. He waits until ten minutes after he’s supposed to close to actually lock the doors and begin cleaning up, since it’s clear that Hansol isn’t coming by that day. Seungkwan takes the cake pop home with him, stuffing it into Soonyoung’s mouth as soon as he opens it widely.

The day after that, Seungkwan waits until five minutes after closing before he sighs, taking the cake pop and putting it into a paper sleeve. He stuffs this one into Seokmin’s mouth, wrinkling his nose as Seokmin licks the frosting off of his lips after.

“Thanks, Seungkwannie,” Seokmin crows, reaching over to pinch Seungkwan’s cheeks. “You’re the best roommate.”

Seungkwan wrinkles his nose again. “I didn’t bring this home for you, okay. Don’t get too used to it.”

By the third day, Seungkwan stops waiting. It’s clear that Hansol isn’t coming by anymore, and even though he doesn’t know why, he doesn’t have any means of finding out— no phone number, no address, nothing.

So Seungkwan puts all of his thoughts of Hansol out of his brain and focuses, instead, on how annoying it is that Soonyoung leaves his toothbrush in Seungkwan’s cup every morning, or on trying to get Seokmin to use the proper sponges to clean the dishes, or on persuading Jeonghan to let him have more afternoon or morning shifts when he’d wanted closing shifts for so long. Anything to avoid thinking about Hansol.

 

* * *

 

Seungkwan is in the middle of watching a video clip of Son Dambi’s acceptance speech for her latest award when he realizes that he needs more eggs for the dinner that he wants to make tonight.

“Soonyoung-hyung!” He calls out, pausing the button and staring at the closed door of his own bedroom. No response. Soonyoung’s job at the bar doesn’t start until a bit later, and Seokmin’s out right now, so— “Soonyoung-hyung? Are you there?”

“What!” He hears, slightly muffled and extremely irate.

“Can you run out and get us some more eggs? I think Seokmin ate all of them last night?”

“Oh right, his omelet,” Seungkwan hears Soonyoung grumble under his breath, as it’s even more muffled than before. “Told him not to use so many damn eggs.”

“So can you go? I’m watching Son Dambi’s stuff right now.” 

“Uhm. I’m kinda busy right now.”

“Busy with _what_?” Seungkwan closes his laptop and rolls out of bed to go open his bedroom door, and then he realizes that the bathroom door’s closed.

“Um. The toilet’s kinda clogged right now,” Soonyoung says through the door. “i gotta fix this shit. Unless you want to. Please?”

Oh, there’s no way in hell Seungkwan’s cleaning Soonyoung’s mess up for him.

“Ahh,” Seungkwan hums. He heads back into his room to grab his keys and wallet before stomping as loudly as he can down the hallway. “Well, I’m going now! Bye!”

The last thing Seungkwan hears before he shuts the door is a long and drawn out “ _Nooooo_.” Poor Soonyoung. Seungkwan told him that the beans last night when they went out to grab some tacos were a bad idea, but he didn’t listen. This is why he needs to listen to Seungkwan more.

It’s a nice day out today. He hums as he walks the short distance to the grocery store— just three blocks away from his apartment. That’s one of the perks of living so far from the school and closer to a more downtown type of area. He grabs a basket once he goes through the door, and he begins looking around for what he might want to eat.

He grabs some cartons of strawberries and blueberries that he’ll force Soonyoung to wash for him later, as well as tangerines and bananas. He heads to the frozen section to pick up some ready-made meals for when he gets off work late and can’t muster up the effort to make himself something good to eat before circling back and snatching a pint— or maybe two— of gelato.

He’s halfway to the cashier when he remembers that he’d come to the grocery store for eggs in the first place, and he ambles back to the dairy section. Yogurt’s on sale today, so Seungkwan tosses a few of those into the cart as well. The eggs come in dozens and cartons of eighteen, and he stands there in front of the display for longer than he really should, just considering which one is cheaper and more efficient to buy so he doesn’t have to waste future trips getting eggs, before he reaches for the carton of eighteen.

As he does, though, someone else’s hand lands abruptly on his, and he pulls his hand back like he’s been burned, an apology already quick on his lips. The apology evaporates off of his tongue when he turns his head to see who he’s accidentally competed with for eggs.

That hand belongs to a tall guy, tanned and handsome, and Seungkwan _knows_ him.

“You’re Hansol’s friend,” Seungkwan says.

“You’re the guy from the Starbucks,” Mingyu says at the same time.

They stand there like that for a bit, neither one of them really sure who gets the carton before Mingyu motions for Seungkwan to take it.

“Your hand was on the bottom, so you were first,” he says, rubbing the back of his neck, and Seungkwan does. Mingyu takes the carton below that one, placing it into his cart, which Seungkwan notices is laden with all sorts of vegetables and meats.

“I didn’t expect you to be the type to cook a lot,” Seungkwan says lightly, trying to make some sort of casual conversation to distract himself from the question that’s on his lips— _Where’s Hansol and why haven’t I seen him for the past few days?_

“Oh yeah,” Mingyu says. He laughs, a low sort of rumbling sound that Seungkwan thinks that he likes. “I’m kind of like a personal chef now. I mean, it’s not really my job, but,” and he sighs, rubbing his temples, “when you live with a bunch of lazy asses who’ll just eat takeout if you won’t cook for them, sometimes you have to take things into your own hands.”

“I totally feel you,” Seungkwan agrees. There’s no way he can count the number of times that Soonyoung and Seokmin have texted him to ask him if he wants to make something delicious and healthy for dinner, or “Otherwise we’ll grab something on the way home. You want anything? Chinese? Thai? Japanese? All of the above?”

Another silence ensues, and when Mingyu looks like he’s about to turn to leave and go pay, Seungkwan blurts out, “Is something wrong with Hansol?”

Mingyu turns, surprise clearly written all over his face. “What?”

Seungkwan clears his throat, trying desperately to ignore how much like a lovesick teenager he sounds like. “Well, Hansol hasn’t been around for a bit, so, um. I was wondering if he’s okay?”

“Oh, yeah, he’s fine.” Mingyu still looks perplexed, and Seungkwan wonders just why when he opens his mouth again. “He’s been kind of busy these past days, though. He heard you were busy, too, so he didn’t want to come by and be a bother.”

Seungkwan could faint out of happiness. Or joy. Or the sheer relief that floods his entire body, settling in the tips of his fingers and his toes. He’s come to terms with his maybe-crush on Hansol, but he’s just glad that the other man doesn’t hate him.

“That was only because I accidentally spilled milk on the ground, so I had to clean it up,” Seungkwan complains, huffing. “I’m not really all that busy, though. The next time you guys come by at night, I’ll be there!”

“That’s good to hear, I’ll let Hansol know. He’s been kind of antsy lately, too.” The expression on Mingyu’s face relaxes a bit, his features settling back into an easy grin, but he looks at his watch before his eyes widen in alarm. “Uh, I’m kind of late for something, so— I gotta go! Don’t be a stranger, okay, Seungkwan? See you around!”

Seungkwan waves Mingyu off, promising to see him again, and he takes his time going through the rest of the grocery store before going to check out and pay. When he walks home this time with his arms laden with bags of groceries, there’s a song on the tip of his tongue and a spring in his step, and it takes him a couple of seconds before he realizes that it’s the song that Hansol had played in the car the time he’d driven Seungkwan home.

 

* * *

 

“You’re back,” are the first words out of Seungkwan’s mouth when he sees a familiar figure open the door.

Hansol smiles back at him— the shadows under his eyes are noticeably darker than they were, and his face is just a bit more wan than it was before, but the smile is the same. “Hey, Seungkwan,” he offers.

“Hansol,” Seungkwan says, leaning on the counter since it’s just the two of them. “Are you okay? Mingyu said that you’ve been really busy, so you really don’t have to come by if there are other things you have to do.”

Hansol shakes his head. “Nah, I’m not that busy anymore. My schedule’s usually pretty manageable, but some days, I just have insane hours, like you seriously wouldn’t even believe how long they keep me there for.”

“What do you do?”

Hansol blinks. “Sorry, what?”

“Your job,” Seungkwan explains. “i just realized that we never really talked about that. I’m here, obviously. What’s got you working such long hours?”

Hansol freezes for a split second before he reaches behind himself to scratch at his neck. “Ah, I work for a— it’s kind of like a start up. It’s a new project. I work with a lot of people, lots of super important people on it, so I can’t really afford to disappoint any of them.” He laughs, a bit sheepishly. “That’s why I’m always working such long hours. There’s kind of a lot riding on whether this goes well or not.”

“You must have a lot on your mind, then,” Seungkwan says, humming underneath his breath. “You shouldn’t let it get to you so much, though. If work ever gets to be too much, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with, just, you know. Taking some time off for yourself. You have to take care of yourself before you can look after other people, Hansol.”

Hansol’s eyebrows are furrowed in the middle of his forehead, like he’s thinking deeply about something, and Seungkwan feels a stab of pity for him. He reaches into the pastry display and takes out a cake pop.

“Cake pop for your thoughts?” Seungkwan jokes, and Hansol takes the stick with a tight smile before he lifts it up to his mouth.

“It’s good,” Hansol says, his eyes wide. “Huh. Honestly, I thought it was going to taste like cardboard, but it tastes even better than the last one you gave me.”

“That’s what the sugar does to you.” Seungkwan grins. “Hopefully it helped you a little?”

“Yeah, it helped a lot,” Hansol agrees. He reaches down, below where Seungkwan can see, and he pulls out his wallet and puts it on the counter.

“No,” Seungkwan says immediately, pushing the wallet back to Hansol. “It’s on me.”

Hansol frowns. “Let me pay for it.”

“No,” Seungkwan says again, slapping Hansol’s hand and grinning in triumph as the other man pulls his hand back, affront clearly written all over his expression.

“Seriously, let me pay, since it’s just a couple thousand won—” Hansol starts, and Seungkwan slaps his hand away again.

“And that’s exactly why you should let me pay for it,” Seungkwan bites back. “Besides, I get an employee discount, it’s fine. It’s no big deal.”

Hansol stares at Seungkwan, who stares right back at him for a while until Hansol laughs, a small huff of air that has the edges of Seungkwan’s lips curving upwards. “Fine,” Hansol says. “You win this time.”

“You’re damn right I do,” Seungkwan scoffs, folding his arms over his chest and watching as Hansol puts his wallet back in his pocket.

“But I want to do something in exchange for you always giving me all these cake pops and letting me get drinks so close to closing time.” Hansol says, and his eyes are twinkling with something that Seungkwan can’t place. “How about this: you’ll let me buy you lunch someday. How does next week sound?”

Seungkwan feels like he’s swimming. He feels like he’s five feet under the surface of the ocean, where his hearing is muffled and his vision is obscured and he can’t be sure whether or not what he’s is reality. But he’s not underwater, he’s standing on dry land, and everything that’s happening right now is happening in real life.

“Um, Earth to Seungkwan,” Hansol says. “You there?”

Seungkwan blinks at him before firmly closing his jaws with a solid snap. Oh, right, he has to answer.

“Hmm, okay. I guess I did get you too much coffee and way too many cake pops already. I’ll eat you out of house and home, Hansol,” Seungkwan says, and then he promptly mentally kicks himself. What is with his phrasing today? What is with his terrible choice of words? Boo Seungkwan, get it together.

Thankfully, Hansol seems to think it’s cute, or something, and he laughs again, showing off his rows of perfectly straight and perfectly white teeth when he tells Seungkwan to put his number into his phone. Seungkwan’s immediately jealous.

“You have a nice smile,” Seungkwan mutters under his breath, taking Hansol’s phone and putting in his name and number, before writing down _Boo Seungkwan: the guy from Starbucks! You’re buying him lunch! Don’t forget!_  in the notes section.

“Really?” Hansol asks, and Seungkwan nods as he passes Hansol back his phone. Hansol looks at the screen before he beams again. “Thanks, Seungkwan. I’ll text you later, yeah?”

“See you, Hansol.” Seungkwan waves to Hansol as he pauses in the doorway to wave back.

“By the way,” Hansol calls out. “You have a pretty smile, too. It suits you.”

Then, with a final wave and a wink, Hansol disappears into the night. Seungkwan watches as the headlights of his car move off into the distance, and when he’s certain that he’s well and truly alone, he collapses onto the counter, burying his face into his arms.

“Fuck,” he mutters, and he knows that his face is warm and that his ears are even warmer. “What am I even _doing_?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> same, seungkwan, what are you doing


	4. dolcissimo

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _dolcissimo: sweetly_

Getting lunch with Hansol is, apparently, the right answer. The address that Hansol texts him later that night is for a restaurant whose name Seungkwan doesn’t recognize. It’s just three train stations down from where Seungkwan lives, but he’s never been to that specific neighborhood.

 _tomorrow okay with you? this is hansol, by the way :)_ , Seungkwan gets a half second later, and there’s no one there to watch him doing it, so he rolls his eyes even though there’s a grin quirking at his lips. Of course it’s Hansol, who else would be texting him?

 _ofc it’s you u_u well it’s already past midnight, so technically it’s later today, but don’t expect me to bring you coffee in the morning!_  Seungkwan texts back. He pauses for just a bit before he sends a sticker of a pink peach folding its arms across its chest.

 _are you sure?_  Hansol sends with a sticker of a brown dog with a wide and shit-eating grin, and Seungkwan narrows his eyes, shifting his position in his chair so he can more easily text back _yeah i’m pretty sure, what do i look like, your personal coffee machine?_

Seungkwan’s too busy sending Hansol a string of mock angry stickers that he doesn’t even notice someone creeping up behind him until it’s too late.

“Damn,” Soonyoung says right into Seungkwan’s ear. “Is this the customer you’re in love with? His name’s Hansol?”

Seungkwan screams, high-pitched and shrill, flinging his arms outward before curling in to protect his phone. Unfortunately, Soonyoung has the reflexes to duck from Seungkwan’s swinging arms, dancing just out of reach with that same infuriating grin on his face. Damn him and his dancer skills.

“His name’s Hansol,” Soonyoung repeats, his eyes gleaming with mirth. “We finally have a name to the hot mystery customer that Seungkwan’s given his darling heart to. So, are you guys going on a date?”

“Go away,” Seungkwan grouses, making sure his phone’s completely off before turning back around.

“Never.”

“Go away,” Seungkwan repeats, getting up and shoving Soonyoung bodily out the door, slamming and locking it behind him. He ignores all of Soonyoung’s screams of “Let me in! I want to know! Boo Seungkwan, let me the fuck in!” and settles into bed.

He has eighteen unread messages to get back to, and he cracks his fingers before he opens the app back up to continue their sticker fight.

Somewhere in between figuring out how to get to the restaurant and telling Hansol to go the fuck to sleep already, Seungkwan realizes that he might be falling a bit faster than he’d thought.

_tmrw at 11 then?_

_ya sounds good! go to sleep already kiddo_

_> :( you’re not even that much older than i am_

_whatever, see you later hansolie the smallest kiddo_

_ughghhhhhh goodnight see ya_

_see yaaa_

 

* * *

 

Hansol is dressed impeccably, in a black blazer with a white button-down and dark wash denim jeans, a pair of what must be designer sunglasses perched on his nose. Seungkwan looks down at his own outfit, a pink and grey sweatshirt with ripped jeans underneath, and immediately feels underdressed. Hansol seems to take notice of it, because he laughs and grabs Seungkwan’s elbow to take him over to a table. It’s a small place, but Seungkwan can tell that it’s well-loved and well-travelled.

“How did you find this place?” Seungkwan asks after they get their menus set in front of them, pages upon pages of bibimbap and japchae and tteokbokki. Seungkwan’s mouth is already watering.

“Oh, my dad’s sister— my auntie— owns this place.” Hansol says. “Just order whatever you want.”

“Isn’t it a little bit too early to be meeting the family?” slips out of Seungkwan’s mouth, his brain to mouth filter clearly malfunctioning today, and when he realizes what he’s just said, his gaze jerks up towards Hansol. He doesn’t look _angry_ , just a little pink, and Seungkwan decides: disaster averted.

“I guess so?” Hansol replies, the same tiny smile on his face and his cheeks still tinged with pink.

“So, um.” Seungkwan clears his throat, trying to clear the air between them. “What’s good here?”

“Hmm.” Hansol doesn’t even bother looking at the menu. “The jjolmyeon here is pretty good. The naengmyeon too, since it’s kinda warm out. But anything here, really, is pretty good.”

“Hmm,” Seungkwan imitates him, affecting a deep baritone before he switches back to his normal voice. “Are you sure you’re not just saying that because it’s your auntie’s food?”

Hansol snorts. “You’ll see. I bet you her food’s gonna knock your—” and Hansol ducks his head underneath the table, which Seungkwan doesn’t quite understand until— “yellow and white striped socks off.”

“Yeah? You wanna bet, kiddo?” Seungkwan challenges. He can’t help it— he’s almost unreasonably competitive, and he loves dares and bets more than anything else. Arguing with Hansol like this is starting to really make him feel something he hasn’t felt in a while.

The waitress comes by with her notepad and a pen then, and they put their bet aside to order. Hansol orders a jjajangmyeon for himself, and when Seungkwan orders just a bibimbap, Hansol orders a plate of tteokbokki. The waitress leaves, but not before patting Hansol on the head. Judging by the way Hansol just takes it, Seungkwan guesses that she must be a cousin or some other type of relative.

“The tteokbokki’s to share. I’m not that much of a pig,” Hansol clarifies to Seungkwan before he grabs a napkin. He pulls out a pen from his bag and starts to write.

“What are you doing?”

“Writing down the terms of our bet.” Hansol looks back up at Seungkwan. “what should we bet on?”

“I dunno. There’s not really anything I can think off.” Seungkwan shrugs, then an idea pops up in his brain. “Oh, wait. I know.”

“What is it?”

“I’ve been thinking about dyeing my hair for a bit now. How about if you win, you get to choose what color I’ll dye my hair next. Deal?” Seungkwan offers.

Hansol seems to consider that before nodding and tapping his pen on his chin. “What’s in it for you if you win, though?”

Seungkwan thinks. “I get to choose what color to dye your hair?” Hansol would look good with blue. With a face like that, he could probably pull off any color. Some things in life are just so unfair.

Hansol blanches. “W— uh. My manager would murder me. He’d murder me and then bring me back to life just so he could murder me again if I ever dyed my hair this close to our deadline.”

“Deadline?”

Hansol nods. “Yeah, we have a deadline for our project coming up soon, and since I’ll be in it, my manager is going to actually skin me alive if I show up to work one day with dyed hair. He’d have a conniption.”

“Okay, I guess dyeing all of your hair is completely out of the question. What about like, tips? Or highlights?” Seungkwan suggests, but it’s quickly shot down by Hansol’s deepening frown.

“How about this, I’ll get a temp tattoo of whatever you want me to.”

“Temp tattoos are _temporary_! That’s not fair!”

“Yeah, well so is hair dye!”

Seungkwan considers his options. Hansol’s right— he could just change his hair back to something he actually likes if Hansol ends up having really shitty taste. “Fine,” he agrees. “But just so you know, if you want to win, the food has to be absolutely amazing, like the best thing I’ve ever had.”

“Yeah, of course,” Hansol says, scoffing as he writes the terms of their agreement down on the napkin and slides it over to Seungkwan to sign. “It’s gonna knock your fucking socks off, Boo. Hope you brought another pair.”

Seungkwan’s about to retort when he reads what Hansol’s written down on the napkin, and he stifles a laugh. “God, Choi, you are so extra. Why are you like this.”

“Just sign the damn thing already. It’s a legal contract, if you must know.”

“Yeah, sure,” Seungkwan signs the napkin with a flourish before he slides it back over to Hansol. “Get ready to get a tattoo of my face tattooed all over your chest, Choi.”

Hansol narrows his eyes at him. “Get ready to have bright neon green hair, Boo.”

The food comes, and they keep eye contact with each other as they take the first bites of their meals. Hansol grins, too wide for Seungkwan’s comfort, once he sees Seungkwan take his first spoonful of bibimbap, and that’s when Seungkwan knows that he’s well and truly fucked.

“I lost,” Seungkwan says after a span of just ten minutes. He stares down at the empty bowl of bibimbap, at what had once held a heaping serving of rice and meat and vegetables. “But holy _shit_ , that was good.”

“Told you,” Hansol says, his voice ten times more cheery now that he doesn’t have to get Seungkwan’s face tattooed on his chest. “Shouldn’t have made the bet with me. Told you it was good.”

“Ugh,” Seungkwan moans, putting his head into his hands. “Choose a pretty color for me, will you?”

Hansol smiles, honey-sweet. “Of course, Seungkwan. Of course.”

 

* * *

 

We, the undersigned, agree to the following binding terms and conditions, which shall be broken down by each individual involved.

If I, Choi Hansol, am the loser of this bet, I do agree to get a temporary tattoo of Boo Seungkwan’s choosing on anywhere on my body of Boo Seungkwan’s choosing if my auntie’s cooking is not, and I quote, “knock my socks off material.”

X _Choi Hansol_

If I, Boo Seungkwan, am the loser of this bet, do agree to dye my hair any color of Choi Hansol’s choosing for at least one month if Choi Hansol’s cooking is “knock my socks off material.”

X _Boo Seungkwan_

Results:  
Winner: Choi Hansol  
Loser: Boo Seungkwan

 

* * *

 

“How about this?” Hansol says, and when Seungkwan turns to see what color he’s chosen, he wishes that he’d never turned at all. They’re in a convenience store, browsing the different colors of hair dye they have, and of course Hansol has the worst taste in the world. He should’ve known right from the start with that vanilla bean frap.

“No,” Seungkwan says, hoping that if he just says no, Hansol will stop bothering him and just let him _live_ for five seconds.

“Why not? It’s nice. I think it’ll suit you.”

Seungkwan stares at the packaging, at the neon pink letters that proudly proclaim “Make yourself a flower fairy in just two hours!” There’s a part of him that recoils at just how _bright_  everything is, but there’s another part of him that hasn’t tried pink yet.

“Please,” he says as a last resort, one that he knows with ninety-nine percent certainty won’t work, and it doesn’t.

“Seungkwan,” Hansol definitely doesn’t croon, because Seungkwan refuses to associate a face like that with a verb like _crooning_ , and will his heart please stop beating so fast already? “We signed a contract. Your soul is bound to it now. You have to do this.”

Then his face softens. “If you don’t like this color, we can choose another one together— I just thought this color would look kinda good on you.” He bites his lip, shifts his weight from one leg to the other, and Seungkwan knows that he’s doomed.

Hansol lifts his eyes up from where he’s been reading the packaging. His eyes are bright and luminous, and Seungkwan feels like he’s falling into them the longer they hold their gazes. Hansol says, in barely a whisper, “It reminds me of spring, like you do.”

Hook, line, and sinker.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :3c


	5. vivacissimo

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _vivacissimo: very lively_

Hansol insists on helping Seungkwan dye his hair. He holds the small plastic bag with the container of hair dye the entire way back to Seungkwan’s apartment, swinging it the way a kid would. It’s kind of cute, if Seungkwan can put aside how he’s been conned into becoming a giant ball of cotton candy for at least a month.

(He’d paid for it, too, sliding his card across the counter to the cashier before Seungkwan could pretend to protest. “It’s all my fault you’re going pink, anyway. I might as well pay for getting to see this, right?” Hansol had said with a grin that had stretched across his face.)

“I think that’s a bad idea,” Seungkwan says immediately, looking over to Hansol. “You probably shouldn’t.”

“Why not?” Hansol frowns, resting his elbow on the window next to him so he can rest his chin on his hand.

Seungkwan doesn’t want to say _because my roommates might be home and I really, really, really, really do not want them to meet you because then I’ll be teased to hell and back for the rest of my entire life_. So he settles for the next best option. “Have you ever dyed hair before?”

Even though he has his sunglasses back on again— who wears sunglasses in a train? apparently Hansol does— Seungkwan can tell that Hansol rolls his eyes up to the ceiling, in what Seungkwan also knows is a silent gesture to his dirty blond hair with the roots starting to grow in. “What do you think?”

Seungkwan narrows his eyes. “No, I mean your own hair. Have you ever done it?”

“Nope. Never.”

“Exactly! Then why do you want to watch?” Seungkwan asks, exasperated. “It’s super boring, and it smells like crap.”

“I just want to watch! I think it’ll be cool. Wow. Maybe if I watch you do it, I’ll get good at it, and then I can dye my hair all sorts of crazy colors and piss _everyone_  off. It’ll be great.” Hansol sounds way too excited for something as mundane as dyeing hair, but—

Seungkwan sighs. He’ll never turn down an opportunity to help someone else wreak as much havoc as they can, and he knows that Hansol’s found his weak spot, accidentally or not. “Fine,” he bites out, his teeth grit. “But it’s going to be cramped and stuffy and stinky as _fuck_ , so don’t say I never warned you.”

“Okay.” Hansol grins, and that’s that. They sit there in silence until the subway pulls into the station closest to Seungkwan’s apartment, and he taps Hansol’s knee to get him to get up when it’s time.

After they leave the station, the way home is like second nature to Seungkwan, and he’s fairly certain that he could navigate it at night with a blindfold on. Not that he’s going to try it anytime soon, but it’s funny to him that Hansol keeps looking around at the buildings.

“See something you like?” Seungkwan quips, light, and Hansol snorts at him.

“It’s just interesting, okay? I haven’t... I haven’t really seen too much of this side of Seoul. It’s been a while since I’ve been back.”

Seungkwan’s limited attention span perks up, and he knows that they’re still walking, but he can’t miss the opportunity to learn more about Hansol. After all, it’s been a good amount of time since they met, but Seungkwan still barely knows anything about him. “Came back? From where?”

“Ah, I live in New York mostly. I was born there, moved back here to Hongdae when I was five, and I moved back there for work.” Hansol sighs. “It’s a lot of traveling.”

“I’d bet,” Seungkwan hums, and he stops in front of his apartment complex . He turns to Hansol, making a grand and sweeping gesture with his arms. “We’re here.”

There are only two flights of stairs in between where they are right now on the ground floor and Seungkwan’s apartment on the third floor, which means Seungkwan only has the amount of time that it’ll take him and Hansol to ascend just two sets of stairs to figure out whether or not Soonyoung and Seokmin are home.

He knows that if they’re home, it’ll be the end of him as he knows it, and he knows that if they’re not home, they’ll find out one way or another and grill him about Hansol until he starts wishing for a portal to open up beneath his feet to swallow him.

The entire way there, Seungkwan mumbles _please don’t be home please don’t be home please don’t be home_  under his breath so many times that Hansol stops on the landing in between flights and looks over at him, his eyebrows furrowed and his forehead wrinkling.

“You okay?” Hansol asks, the bag still in his hands.

“Yeah,” Seungkwan replies, trying his best not to let just how nervous he really is show through. He thinks he’s succeeding. _Thinks_. “Just wondering if my roommates are home.”

“Oh. Are they?”

Hansol’s a bit skittish suddenly, and Seungkwan wonders just why. Come to think of it, Hansol’s never seemed up for meeting Seungkwan’s friends, but he’s always been game to hear Seungkwan talk about them at length. “I don’t know. Maybe? If you’re not up for meeting them today, there’s always next time.”

Seungkwan watches as Hansol visibly relaxes, the worried lines of his face disappearing. “Yeah, I’d like that,” he says, and Seungkwan files this away in his brain for future reference. Interesting.

Neither Soonyoung nor Seokmin ends up being home, which Seungkwan considers karmic retribution for having to dye his hair pink, of all possible colors in the world, today. If he’s going to do this, he better have no audiences other than the one person who’s directly responsible for this.

They end up squishing into the small bathroom, Seungkwan apologizing for how cramped it is and Hansol apologizing for not thinking it out. He listens carefully, though, as Seungkwan describes to him how he’s going to make his hair pink today. His hair’s already a light blond, so he won’t need to bleach it more today, which must be another point in his favor.

Boo Seungkwan: two; universe: still a lot more than two, but at least Seungkwan has two points now, compared to the negatives he’d been in before.

“You’ve really never done this before? Seriously?” Seungkwan asks.

“Please, not everyone has the time to do it themselves. I’ve always watched other people in salons do it for me, but never at home. This is pretty cool.” Hansol shrugs. “And I like the color. It’s better than all the different shades of honey golden brown they keep putting me through.”

Seungkwan hums in response. He can’t talk much— he has to concentrate. He’s halfway through combing the dye through his hair when he hears the telltale jingling of Soonyoung’s keys in the lock, and they both freeze. Hansol’s eyes go almost comically wide before Seungkwan is shoving at him with his free hand, pushing him towards the back of their apartment.

“There’s a fire escape outside of this door,” Seungkwan hisses, opening the door to reveal a set of stairs leading outside. “You can get out through here if you need to go, and it’s pretty easy to reach the main street from there. Any questions?”

Hansol pauses. “Seungkwan, I—” he stops, then shakes himself. “Never mind. I’ll text you later, yeah? Remember to show me what it looks like!”

“I will,” Seungkwan says, and once Hansol leaves, he closes the door behind him. He trudges back to the bathroom to finish dyeing his hair, but somehow, it’s just not as fun as it was before when Hansol was there making dumb jokes about cotton candy. Seungkwan sighs. It’s going to be a very long and a very boring next two hours.

 

* * *

 

In retrospect, it could’ve been a lot worse. Seungkwan stares at his reflection in the mirror, after he’s done rinsing all of the dye out and blow drying his hair. It had been a sort of nasty bubblegum pink shade when he’d first brushed the dye through, something similar to what was advertised on the tacky packaging. But now, after it’s all said and done, it’s faded to a lighter shade of pink, and in the right lighting, it looks like a very nice shade of rose gold.

Not bad for a dare he’d expected to end in nothing short of disaster.

Seungkwan takes a few mirror selcas just to show off his new hair color, and a few from above as well. He decides to send them to Hansol ninety percent as proof and just ten percent because he’s proud of the way that it’s ended up looking. 

 _i did it_ , he types out. _are you proud of me yet?_

He sends the message through after checking it over— Is it too casual? Too formal? Should he use a sticker? Any emojis?— and attaches the photos to it. He stares at the screen, feeling a very strange sort of finality, like this is the end of it all now that he’s finished with the dare. He shakes himself. There’s no way.

“Oi!” Soonyoung yells from outside, knocking on the door. “Hey, Boo Seungkwan, are you done yet, or was your shit really that big? I really really need to pee!”

Ugh. Seungkwan closes the app and opens the door, and Soonyoung very nearly falls through the doorway and onto him.

“It’s all yours,” Seungkwan chirps, and he ignores the questions that Soonyoung, now more wide-eyed than he’s ever seen, throws at his back.

“Wait, why are you pink? Boo Seungkwan! Why are you pink? Oh, shit, I really need to pee, but just you wait! I’ll get the answers out of you in no time!”

Seungkwan meanders back to his room, and he only has a few minutes of pure happiness as he scrolls through his feed before Soonyoung slams the door open. His grin widens, making him look something like a Cheshire cat, when he spies Seungkwan sitting up against the headboard.

“So,” Soonyoung says, plopping down on the foot of Seungkwan’s bed.

“So,” Seungkwan repeats, barely resisting the urge to sink into the pillows with the way that Soonyoung’s staring at him, his gaze unwavering.

“Why are you pink?”

“I lost a bet,” Seungkwan mutters. There’s really no point in trying to keep secrets from someone like Soonyoung— he pounces on any sign of weakness in order to tease out the truth. Their first year of living together, Seokmin had learned that the hard way when Soonyoung had put a leftover slice of cake in the fridge and discovered it missing the next morning. The manhunt had been pretty brutal, and it’s an experience that Seungkwan doesn’t want to repeat again. Getting interrogated isn’t really all that fun.

“Ooh.” Soonyoung leans forward and he opens his mouth, and Seungkwan really should’ve expected what was about to happen next, but he doesn’t. “Seokmin! Come here, Seungkwan’s gonna tell us about his crush! Remember Hansol? His crush!”

“What?” Seungkwan shrieks. “No!”

“You are?” Seokmin barrels through the doorway and does a flying leap onto the other side of Seungkwan’s bed, and Seungkwan squirms. There are way too many people on his tiny bed right now. “Tell us, we’ve been waiting so long for updates.”

“No,” Seungkwan says, feeling his face start to flush. “There’s nothing, like I mean we only got lunch but then that’s it, we’re not like, going out or anything— oh shit.”

“Ooh, you guys got lunch?” Seokmin says, leaning forward as well. “Isn’t that a date?”

“No!”

“But you dyed your hair pink for him,” Soonyoung follows up for Seokmin. “Wow, is it the season of love now? Is your entire world pink now?”

“Oh my god,” Seungkwan moans, slapping his hands over his face. “What did I ever do to deserve this.”

Then there are fingers peeling away the hands that cover his face, and Seungkwan blinks when he sees both Seokmin and Soonyoung smiling at him, soft and gentle.

“Hey,” Seokmin says, patting Seungkwan’s hand. “It’s okay. We just want you to be happy, okay?”

“Oh,” Seungkwan replies, extremely touched. They don’t usually get all serious like this, just because their friendship is one that relies mostly on gags and jokes, and that’s what makes moments like these all the more unexpected and memorable.

“I hope you and your definitely-not-a-boyfriend Hansol are happy together,” Soonyoung says solemnly, and Seungkwan is about to pat Soonyoung’s hand when he says, “Seokmin and I want to be godparents to whatever marshmallow of a baby you guys end up having! I call best man!”

“You ruined it,” Seokmin says, slapping Soonyoung on the arm.

“Maybe,” Soonyoung admits, but he looks over to Seungkwan. “But at least you’re smiling now, right?”

Soonyoung’s right. His ears are burning and the back of his neck feels too warm, but it’s hard to concentrate on any of it when his cheeks feel like they’re about to split from how widely he’s grinning. “Yeah,” Seungkwan chokes out.

“Ew,” Soonyoung groans as Seungkwan launches himself at them, his arms wrapping around both of their shoulders, but his arms come up to hug Seungkwan back.

“Aw,” Seokmin sighs happily. “Young love. To be young again.”

“Shut up, hyung,” Seungkwan says, but it’s hard to keep the smile from showing through in his voice. “I love you guys.”

 

* * *

 

Seungkwan doesn’t get a reply that night.

He waits, but he doesn’t get one in the next few days, either. He stops checking for messages after a week’s passed, and before he knows it, an entire month has gone by. He doesn’t know what’s wrong, or if anything bad has happened, but all he knows is that Hansol’s definitely seen and read the messages and photos and hasn’t even bothered to dignify them with a response.

He doesn’t know if it’s something that he said that made Hansol decide to stop talking to him, or if he saw the pictures that Seungkwan sent over and decided, all of a sudden, that Seungkwan was too ugly for him, or any other excuse out of the plethora of reasons that Seungkwan’s spent the past month conjuring up. It’s not that difficult to say that he doesn’t want to talk to Seungkwan anymore, or to say _haha, nice :)_  even if he doesn’t mean it at all and then leave it at that, but for some reason, the complete radio silence is absolutely killing Seungkwan inside.

He doesn’t mean to, but it must end up seeping into his personality and the way he acts around people, since Soonyoung and Seokmin pick up on it, and Jeonghan does, too, and he can’t quite deal with how prying they all are. They ask him questions for the longest time at first, asking him _Seungkwan, are you okay_ or _Seungkwan, what's wrong? You can talk to me, just let it all out if you ever need to._

He knows they’re well-meaning and that they really only want the best for him, but he can’t put up with the way they look at him with something akin to pity in their eyes. It’s too much.

So Seungkwan decides to stop waiting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry :-(


	6. lacrimoso

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _lacrimoso: sorrowfully_

Seungkwan is halfway through a shift when Soonyoung texts him. He’s asked Jeonghan for more shifts, fully intending on making enough money so that he can take a vacation and go home soon. Plane tickets back home to Jeju aren’t cheap, and neither is taking two weeks off of work. But it’s something he’s determined to do his best to make happen, since he hasn’t gone home in what feels like an eternity. He tries his best not to think about how he works so much to forget.

 _hey_ , the message from Soonyoung reads when Seungkwan excuses himself to the back room. It’s fairly empty, so Jeonghan should be able to hold down the fort on his own. _u wanna get dinner w me and wonwoo?? its just gonna be a group of us and friends do u wanna come with??_

Seungkwan wrinkles his nose. _are u drunk alr? i thought ur friend was doing his hotshot manager thing 2_

 _nah._  The reply comes almost instantaneously. _the actor he was working for went back to america or smth idk hes back now tho since he was just the guys krn manager_

_oh_

_so do u wanna come????????? say yes pls say yes u would make it soooooo fun come my lil bubblegum fairy_

Seungkwan considers his options. He could go out with Soonyoung and his friends tonight and just have fun without worrying about anything at all, or he could stay at home and wallow in his own emotions and watch reruns of sad indie films until he ends up crying on the couch. The answer is obvious.

 _im good hyung_ , Seungkwan texts back. _thx tho_

Even though his phone starts vibrating like crazy with the sheer amount of messages that he’s getting, he doesn’t have the chance to see what it is that Soonyoung replies back to him, since Jeonghan calls for him from out front. Apparently, one of the other baristas had called in sick, and now Seungkwan’s needed to help close up at the end of the night. It’s no problem at all— taking on more hours means having more money in his pocket, and having more money means he’s just that much closer to his goal of becoming an emcee or a singer one day.

It’s half past nine when Seungkwan finally gets to take off his apron and hang it up on the wall. Jeonghan’s still bustling around, making sure that all of the perishables are in the freezer and everything that can be thrown away has been put into the appropriate bins.

“Goodnight, hyung,” Seungkwan calls out, a hand on the door.

“Wait, Seungkwan!” Jeonghan shouts, which makes Seungkwan turn around, the door nearly slamming into him when he stops holding it open. “Oh, be careful.”

“What’s up, Jeonghan-hyung?”

“Seungkwan, I know you’ve been taking a lot of shifts since you just want to go home,” Jeonghan starts. His eyes soften around the edges. “Don’t overwork yourself, though, okay? Remember to take care of yourself.”

Seungkwan blinks, feeling a lump of something that he can’t swallow blocking his words. “Thanks— yeah, I will, hyung. Thanks. Have a good night.”

Jeonghan waves to him before he goes back to sorting the coffee beans, and Seungkwan steps out of the shop. He realizes, a split second too late, that it’s raining, and only the flimsy canopy covering the entrance is preventing Seungkwan from being drenched in the downpour.

He reaches into his bag for the umbrella he’d packed just this morning and mentally thanks his mom for texting him the day’s weather since she knows he won’t check it himself. Even though it’s cold and wet outside, Seungkwan stays dry the entire way home underneath the shadow of his tangerine-print umbrella.

 

* * *

 

The apartment is dark and empty when Seungkwan opens the door, and he flicks on the lights and shakes his umbrella off before leaving it in the doorway to dry. Soonyoung must’ve taken Seokmin to that thing with his friends, Seungkwan figures. He has the entire place to himself tonight, which is never not a good thing.

Except there’s a sudden knock on the door, and Seungkwan freezes in place. A multitude of scenarios start running through his mind at breakneck speed, a majority of them inspired by the films Soonyoung had forced him to watch with him and Seokmin. It’s dark and raining outside, and Seungkwan knows that if he were in a horror movie, these two things combined probably wouldn’t bode well at all for him.

For what’s probably the first time ever, Seungkwan wishes, as his mind is flooded with images of masked men breaking in through the window and grabbing him and tossing him into a burlap sack, that Seokmin and Soonyoung were there to help him out— or at least to look through the peephole to see who it is.

He stands there in the doorway just wondering if whoever had knocked is gone since he isn’t expecting anyone, and just when Seungkwan is about to turn and go wash up, he hears another knock.

Seungkwan stiffens. It definitely isn’t just someone who’s gotten the wrong address, then. He knows that he should just open the door, since the chances of this actually being a horror movie are slim to none, and it’s probably a neighbor or a concerned citizen telling him that he’s left something outside again. But it’s dark and rainy and—

“Seungkwan, it’s me. Can you open the door? I have so much to tell you. Please.”

Seungkwan freezes, his arms coming to rest limply at his sides. He knows this voice. Then, just as suddenly as it had started raining earlier, he feels the beginnings of anger start to bubble up within him. What right does _he_  have to come back after a month like nothing’s happened at all? What right does _he_ have to try to come back into Seungkwan’s life again?

His fists ball up against his will, and he decides _fuck it_ before he storms forward and unlocks the door and throws it open.

“What,” Seungkwan snaps as shortly as he can, crossing his arms over his chest— he tells himself it’s so he can look tough in front of Hansol, but the cold is starting to seep in.

“Seungkwan,” Hansol says so softly that Seungkwan would’ve missed it if his ears weren’t searching for any sound, any at all.

Seungkwan looks up. Hansol is soaked from head to toe, his hoodie and his jeans clinging to his body. His hair is plastered to his face, and rivulets of water run down his neck. Seungkwan almost reaches out to wipe Hansol’s face off before he freezes, his hand hanging outstretched in the space between them.

“Hansol,” Seungkwan replies, his hand coming back down. He has so many things that he wants to ask and even more things he wants to say, but his mouth feels like there are tons of cotton balls inside of it. He doesn’t trust himself to voice the thoughts that have been running through his mind the entire past month.

_Where did you go? Why didn’t you tell me you were leaving? Why did you come back? I thought we were friends?_

Instead, he stares up at Hansol, searching for something in Hansol’s eyes that’ll convince him that he’s still the same person.

“I’m sorry,” Hansol says, and Seungkwan can tell by the emotions swimming there in Hansol’s gaze when he looks down, that he really is the same Hansol.

“You left,” Seungkwan chokes out, making a movement to reach for Hansol again. He watches the way Hansol’s eyes track his gestures, the way Hansol’s eyes dim in disappointment when Seungkwan pulls his hands back to himself.

“I know. I’m sorry, Seungkwan. Will you let me explain to you?” Hansol asks before his face scrunches up, and Seungkwan has only a split second to wonder why before Hansol sneezes all over Seungkwan’s face.

“Let’s— let’s get you cleaned up first,” Seungkwan says, grabbing Hansol’s wrist and leading him inside before he closes the door. Once he leads Hansol into the doorway, he turns so that he doesn’t have to look at Hansol’s face anymore. “I’m going to the bathroom, just gotta grab a towel.”

When he makes it to the bathroom, he locks the door behind him and leans against the door, breathing out heavily. He stares up at the ceiling light, willing his heart to calm down, before he grabs the spare towel in the linen cabinet.

Hansol is still standing there in the middle of the doorway when Seungkwan comes back out, and he raises his head at the sound of the door unlocking. Seungkwan swallows. The expression on his face is unlike anything Seungkwan’s ever seen on anyone, let alone on Hansol, before— it’s a mixture of something akin to desperation and guilt and sadness, and Seungkwan has never felt worse.

Seungkwan steps closer, feeling his heart leap into his throat when he gets closer to Hansol. He loops the towel as gently as he can around Hansol’s shoulders, saying as lightly as he can, “Don’t go dying on me now, you hear me?”

Hansol doesn’t smile back, and Seungkwan frowns. All of the emotions he’d felt before are starting to disappear and are slowly being replaced with worry.

“Hey, Hansol, are you okay? I’m not really that mad, I just want to know why you just suddenly left without telling me.” Seungkwan reaches upwards to start drying Hansol’s hair off, taking both ends and pulling the towel back and forth. “Are you okay? You can tell me.”

Seungkwan watches Hansol’s Adam’s apple bob in his throat, and Hansol wipes his hands on his already wet jeans before he starts talking. “Seungkwan, I’m sorry. I haven’t been telling you the truth.”

“What do you mean?” Seungkwan’s eyebrows furrow.

“I—” and Hansol cuts himself off here, like the words are stuck in his mouth. He clears his throat and starts again. “I think it’ll be easier to show you instead of telling you. I have a work function tomorrow. If you come with me, you’ll figure everything out. And after that, I’ll tell you everything. I’ll tell you why I had to leave and why I couldn’t come back until now. I promise. I’ll tell you all the answers you want and all the answers you don’t want. I swear to you, Seungkwan, I’m not lying. Please believe me.”

Seungkwan doesn’t know what’s compelling him to listen and to believe, but he feels like this time, Hansol has nothing to hide. He wants to figure out everything— why Hansol had come here in the first place, why he’d been so skittish at the possibility of meeting Soonyoung and Seokmin, why Hansol had left him.

“Okay,” Seungkwan says, soft. “I trust you.” Then, on an impulse that Seungkwan has absolutely no idea where it’s from, he adds, “Don’t even think about keeping any more secrets from me, though, punk. Three strikes and you’re out.”

Hansol smiles then, and even though it’s small and hesitant, it’s still the first time that Seungkwan’s seen his toothy grin in over a month, and he could cry of relief. He could burst into tears with how full and happy he feels right now, and it feels like something in his chest is threatening to explode.

Hansol must’ve noticed a shift in the expression in Seungkwan’s face, because _his_ face changes as well. “Seungkwan? Are you okay?”

Seungkwan stares up at him, taking in how wide and large Hansol’s eyes are, how ruddy and pink his cheeks are now that they’ve warmed up, how fluffy his hair looks now that it’s mostly been dried, and he feels the echoes of that same emotion from all the way before when Hansol had dropped him off at his apartment. Except now he knows exactly what that emotion is, and he knows that this is something that he can’t let go again. He has to act on this, has to let Hansol know how he feels before it’s all too late, has to make Hansol _his_.

And so, before Seungkwan can convince himself that this is a no good, very bad, extremely terrible idea, he pitches forward, grabs both ends of the towel around Hansol’s shoulders, and pulls the other man down to his level. Seungkwan pauses for just a nanosecond while he has Hansol’s face startlingly close to his, his eyes bright and shining and his mouth open in a wide o, before he decides _fuck it_  once more, and pulls Hansol to him.

Hansol’s lips are, despite the cold of outside, warm and soft, and if Seungkwan had thought that Hansol’s eyes were already big enough before, they’re nothing compared to how big they are after he pulls away.

“Sorry,” Seungkwan mumbles, keeping his eyes fixed on the ground. He feels his face begin to heat up, and it’s only now that he realizes just what a colossal mistake he’s made. Now that he’s ruined one of his most treasured friendships by pulling his feelings where they’re not supposed to be, Hansol is _never_  going to talk to him again.

“Hey,” Hansol says, his voice just barely above a whisper. He sounds amused, but Seungkwan still refuses to look up. “Hey, Seungkwan.”

Then Hansol’s fingers are under Seungkwan’s chin, tipping his face upward, and Seungkwan finally sees just how bright and full of mirth Hansol’s eyes are.

“Seungkwan, I think I know what you want to say, and I want to say it to you, too,” Hansol says, leaning down, and when Seungkwan closes his eyes, he feels a Hansol’s lips press butterfly-soft against his forehead. He opens his eyes again, and Hansol is still too close to his face. “But I’ll explain more after tomorrow, okay?”

Seungkwan nods, so frozen that he can’t really process just what is happening. Hansol grins at him again. “I’ll pick you up tomorrow. Do you have anything nice to wear?”

“Um. Kind of?” Seungkwan has his high school uniform and the suit he’d worn to his job interview at Starbucks, but he feels like if he mentions these to Hansol, he’ll have his options get vetoed. Seungkwan definitely doesn’t have time to go shop for clothes right now.

“Great.” Hansol’s smile makes his eyes crinkle. He takes the towel off of his shoulders, folds it up into a small square, and gives it back to Seungkwan before inching towards the door. “I’ll see you tomorrow then, Seungkwan.”

“Wait,” Seungkwan says, reaching for his umbrella on the ground. “It’s raining outside, take this.”

“Oh.” Hansol blinks, his face smoothing out into surprise before the grin reappears. He takes the umbrella from Seungkwan, and Seungkwan tries not to shiver at the electric shock that passes between them when Hansol’s fingers brush against his. Hansol’s eyes flicker up to Seungkwan’s hair.

“You kept the hair color we bet on,” he breathes out. “It looks really good on you. I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you earlier, my internet connection was really shitty up until now, and I hadn’t realized that they didn’t send at all. But I wanted to tell you that the pink really suits you. I told you it would look nice.”

Seungkwan tries not to let his heart stop right then and there. He’s surprised that Hansol noticed at all, let alone realized that the dye would havae already faded. But Seungkwan just redyed it last week, so it’s more vibrant than it had been before. “Thanks,” Seungkwan mumbles. “You have a good eye.”

Hansol’s expression softens, and he reaches forward to pat Seungkwan on the cheek. “Thanks, Seungkwan. I owe you. See you tomorrow at five. I’ll text you later about it,” he says, and then he’s unlocking the door and stepping out into the darkness and Seungkwan’s alone again.

He stays there in the living room for so long that when Seokmin and Soonyoung stumble in, clearly too drunk for their own goods, they try to cuddle up next to him on the couch, which results in Seungkwan having to cart them off to bed. When he gets back into his own bed, though, he checks his messages.

There are messages from Hansol dating back to when Seungkwan had first sent the photos of his newly dyed hair, and Seungkwan realizes that they’d only just sent.

 _told u it would look good!!!! hahahahahha i knew it_  
_calm down tho at this rate ur probably gonna become more handsome than me ;)_

Seungkwan buries his face into his pillow and screams. He holds the scream for as long as he can without having to come up for air, and when he does have to surface for air, he takes a deep breath before screaming again. There’s no other way to deal with what he’s feeling, and when he’s all spent, he collapses back onto his bed, staring up at his feeling.

Seungkwan only hopes that tomorrow is going to be even better— he can’t wait to know just what Hansol’s been hiding this entire time. He also can’t wait for the free food that’s probably going to be there at a work function, and when he falls asleep, his dreams are filled with the very confusing image of finger food sized carrots dancing around with Hansol’s face plastered on them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the towel scene was the only part of this that kept me going if i'm gonna be real frickin honest here whew!!! almost done!!! just two more chaps T____T


	7. espressione

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _espressione: with feelings_

Seungkwan spends more time than is probably necessary staring at himself in the mirror, adjusting his tie. He’s probably overdressed for the occasion, but Seungkwan figures that if Hansol’s asking him to come to a work function with him, he might as well dress for the part, even if it’s a bit much.

He purses his lips at his messy hair, and he decides against letting it be artfully messy. Seokmin’s hair wax is just on the shelf, so Seungkwan takes some and smooths it through his hair into a style he’s comfortable with. He looks alright. He’s lucky he remembered to keep his suit jacket here in his apartment instead of bringing it back home, and his hair, now styled so just a bit of his forehead shows through, looks nice. Good.

“Ugh,” he hears from outside the bathroom door, along with some taps on the door. It’s Soonyoung, who’s probably just woken up and who’s probably hungover as hell. “God, I’m never drinking again, who the fuck let me do so many shots? Wait, let me in, I gotta puke—”

The light taps from before turn to rapid knocks, and Seungkwan moves quickly to the door and unlocks it so Soonyoung can do what he has to do. He waits outside the door, smoothing his shirt down. “You okay in there, hyung?”

“Yeah, just give me a sec— you look so cute right now, Seungkwanie, what’s the date?”

Seungkwan tries to stop the flush from rising to his cheeks, but it does anyway. “It’s not a date. Just going with Hansol to a work thing.” There’s a knock at the door, one that doesn’t come from inside the bathroom, but from outside the apartment, and Seungkwan knows who’s here. “I’ll see you later, okay, hyung? Feel better.”

“Okay,” Soonyoung yells through the door. “Have fun! Be safe! Don’t— urgh— don’t do anything I wouldn’t do!”

“Doesn’t that mean i can do pretty much anything I want, though?” Seungkwan muses as he makes his way through the apartment to the door. He opens the door, and whatever witty opening line he’d had evaporates in his throat. “Whoa.”

Hansol reddens, a flush creeping across his cheekbones. “Thanks, Seungkwan. You’re not too shabby yourself.”

Seungkwan would argue that Hansol looks a _lot_ better than he does. The first thing he notices is that he’s not overdressed— Hansol is clad in a three-piece suit. It’s just that while Seungkwan’s suit is one that his mom had picked out from a department store in Jeju, Hansol’s suit is clearly tailored, hugging all of his curves and all of his angles in the right places. His hair is swept up, giving him a sort of roguishly handsome vibe. There’s just a light covering of foundation on his face, enough to cover up the imperfections that aren’t there.

Seungkwan thinks he looks amazing, and apparently his brain to mouth filter isn’t working correctly, because the flush on Hansol’s cheeks only deepens in color, and he mutters a, “Stop flattering me, Seungkwan, you look good, too.”

“Anyway,” Hansol coughs, straightening up and taking Seungkwan’s elbow. “Let’s go.”

When Hansol leads Seungkwan down to the parking lot, what Seungkwan is expecting is the car that his friends had driven home that one night Seungkwan had most definitely not fainted onto Hansol (and it seems so long ago, so long ago that it feels almost like a dream). What Seungkwan is not expecting is a long black limousine that probably takes up two entire parking spaces.

“Um,” Seungkwan starts as Hansol pulls him to the limo. “Are you sure this is the right one?”

Hansol turns and gives Seungkwan a curious smile, one that Seungkwan can’t quite decipher the meaning of. “Yep. Now hop in. They’re not going to be waiting for us forever.”

The seats inside the limo are plush and velvety, and when Seungkwan sits down gingerly, he sinks in almost immediately. He starts, nearly jumping out of his skin, and Hansol pats his knee. “It’s okay, that happened to me the first time, too. You’ll get used to it.”

Get used to _what_? Seungkwan’s mind is spinning with the reality that Hansol is apparently a rich kid who takes limousines to work functions. But if Hansol is a rich kid who takes limousines to work functions, then why is _Seungkwan_  going to have to get used to it?

He’s still puzzling over it when the limo pulls into a smooth stop. The windows are tinted, so even when Seungkwan tries to look outside, it’s hard to tell exactly where he is. Hansol must sense his unease, because he smiles and reaches over to take Seungkwan’s hand in his and he says, “We’re here. Let’s go.”

There’s a split second of silence between them, and Seungkwan swallows before he says, “Let’s.”

The door opens, and as he steps out of the limo, Seungkwan’s world explodes in light and sound. There are cameras, large and heavy, pointed straight at Seungkwan and Hansol— no, they’re not pointed at Seungkwan, they’re pointed at Hansol, at only Hansol. When Seungkwan looks up at Hansol, he looks like a completely different person, his back straight and his head held high and his gaze strong and steely and only facing forward.

Hansol leads them onto the red carpet, where more cameras are waiting, and all that’s keeping Seungkwan from freaking out is Hansol’s hand in his.

A reporter runs up to them, jamming microphones into Hansol’s face, and more follow, yelling question upon question upon question.

“How are you today— who is this person— is he your significant other— would you like to introduce him— how do you feel about your role in— are you excited for the premiere of it tonight— do you have anything else to say—”

Seungkwan loses track of how many questions Hansol answers with the same placid smile on his face, and he doesn’t miss the way that Hansol expertly answers all of the questions that the reporters direct to Seungkwan. Good thing, too, since Seungkwan doesn’t trust himself to speak right now.

Out of the corner of his eye, Seungkwan spots another limousine pull up by the curb, and the cameras and microphones all flock to the next person that steps out of the car, someone who’s tall and handsome and striding with long legs onto the carpet. They’re ushered into a large theater, and Seungkwan doesn’t have it in him to speak to Hansol until the lights have dimmed.

“What is this?” Seungkwan hisses. “What is this— what is all of this?”

“I’ll explain.” Hansol grins, his smile clearly visible in the dark. He squeezes Seungkwan’s hand. “But after, okay? I don’t want you to miss this.”

Seungkwan doesn’t miss a thing. It’s hard not to, when the movie is so loud and bright and everywhere around him, and even though the sensations that he’s getting from all the noise and pictures are overwhelming, the warmth of Hansol’s hand in his is in the forefront of his mind. He tries to focus anyway.

It’s just a movie at first, one that opens on the countryside, all green grass and brown fields. Seungkwan wrinkles his nose. Did Hansol bring him here just to watch a _movie_? They could’ve gone to the theater close to Seungkwan’s apartment, the one that’s in the complex with the rest of all of the local businesses.

Then— oh. It’s not just any regular movie, it’s a spy movie, the kind where all the agents have impeccably tailored suits and impeccably styled hair, and surprise surprise, the face that stares back at him from the screen is Hansol’s. It’s a good movie, if Seungkwan can ignore the way that a face that’s so familiar to him is being projected onto a screen the size of Seungkwan’s apartment building, which he can’t.

Buildings explode, secrets are exposed, friendships are broken, and the briefcase that everyone had been fighting over is revealed to have a dossier of potentially world-ending information inside of it. And, of course, Hansol is the one to take a lighter to the dossier, and the film cuts to black on a shot of Hansol with the lighter in his hand and looking into the sunset.

All in all, it’s not a bad film. Seungkwan knows, by the way that Hansol is practically _vibrating_  next to him, that Hansol wants to know what Seungkwan thinks of it. He knows that Hansol wants to know what Seungkwan thinks of _him_ , of the Hansol that isn’t Hansol with the overly long coffee order, of the Hansol that isn’t the one who comes five minutes before closing, of the Hansol who laughs with and talks to Seungkwan like he’s a regular friend.

Except when the credits roll, the name that shares the line with the name of Hansol’s character in the movie isn’t just Hansol but Hansol Vernon Choi, and just like that, all the pieces start to fall into place. All of the pieces that Seungkwan realizes have been in his face in the entire time, all of the pieces that he hasn’t bothered to put into one concrete picture are coming together now.

He knows now, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that Hansol isn’t a normal guy like Seungkwan is— that he’s never _been_  normal, that he’s been this celebrity all along. And as Hansol tightens his fingers on Seungkwan’s, Seungkwan knows that he’s going to have a _great_ time getting all the answers out of Hansol later.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> aaaaahhh thank you so much for 200 kudos T___T <333 it means so much to me!! we're nearing the end now, and i think it'll have what a lot of you guys were waiting for, so thank you alllllll so much for those who've given it love so far ;;;___;;;


	8. teneramente

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _teneramente: tenderly_

After the movie— and Seungkwan realizes now that it’s not just any movie, it’s the Korean premiere of what must have been the reason Hansol came to Korea— Hansol ushers Seungkwan out of the theater, expertly dodging all of the reporters on his way back to the limo. Except this time, the car that pulls up on the curb isn’t a long black limousine, but the same small buggy that Hansol’s friend had driven them back in before.

Hansol opens the rear door for Seungkwan, and now that it’s just the two of them, Hansol seems less sure of himself, a bit more hesitant when they’re far away from the watchful eyes of the cameras.

“So,” Hansol starts, but Seungkwan isn’t paying attention. Instead, he’s craning his head this way and that, and after he’s certain that no cameras are around, he takes a step closer to Hansol and reaches up to flick him in the exposed part of his forehead. “What— ow!”

“Serves you right for keeping so much shit from me,” Seungkwan scoffs before he clambers into the back seat. He’s immediately greeted by familiar faces.

“Hey, Seungkwan!” Mingyu chirps from the driver’s seat, and Seungcheol waves to him from the passenger seat. “Long time no see!”

“Oh hey, guys! Did you know Hansol’s real name is Vernon?” Seungkwan asks brightly as Hansol slides into the seat next to him, looking properly chastised. Seungcheol and Mingyu exchange a _look_ , and realization dawns on Seungkwan for what must be the fiftieth time today.

“You guys were _in on this_! I trusted you! You even let me take the carton of eggs!”

“Seungkwan,” Hansol says, and Seungkwan turns his attention back to him. “Let me introduce you to my bodyguards, Seungcheol and Mingyu.”

“And what about you?” Seungkwan asks, fixing his eyes on Hansol’s.

“What?”

“Who are you?”

Hansol keeps his gaze steady as he replies, every word carefully enunciated. “My name is Hansol Vernon Choi, and I’m an actor from New York. I came to Seoul to film certain parts of my movie and to help promote the movie overseas.”

A light bulb flickers on in Seungkwan’s brain. He remembers the very first time that he’d met Hansol, when a man with a baseball cap and a face mask came in to order a vanilla bean frap and said that his name was— “Verhansol.”

“Verhansol wha— oh, right. Yeah. That. I was about to say the name I went by in America, since that’s really my mom’s middle name, but I didn’t want to be recognized, so I switched halfway. I guess I should’ve known that I’d have no problem with that with you.” Hansol rubs the back of his neck. “I was kinda surprised, actually. I thought you might’ve recognized me, so I kinda panicked.”

“Pfft, _no_.” Seungkwan snorts. “I was just wondering why all the girls started taking out their phones to take pictures of you. Guess it’s because you’re a hotshot?”

“I’m not really a hotshot, I’m kinda just so-so,” Hansol replies, waving his hands in front of him frantically, as if he’s trying to dispel any notion that he’s famous at all.

“He’s lying,” Seungcheol calls out, and the sound of his voice jerks Seungkwan back to the reality that he and Hansol aren’t alone in the car. “He won best supporting actor last year, don’t believe a _single_  word this liar says!”

“Ugh, why are you like this. I hate you, can we just go back to Seungkwan’s place to drop him off already so you can stop being mean to me like this,” Hansol groans, and Mingyu laughs, the sound reverberating throughout the car.

“No one’s being mean to you! You started it!” Mingyu singsongs, but he starts the car anyway.

Hansol leans over to the side and presses a button, which makes a divider appear between the front and the back of the car. He takes a deep breath before he turns to Seungkwan again. “Okay, this is soundproof, so we don’t have to worry about them being nosy and listening. But I have things I gotta tell you—”

“Wow, cool car,” Seungkwan says, staring out of the window. The scenery of the most affluent part of Seoul, where he doesn’t usually have the chance to visit, passes by in a blur all around him. “Does it always do that?”

“Seungkwan,” Hansol says. “You were the first person I met who didn’t judge me because of how I looked.”

Seungkwan looks over.

“You were the first person I met ever since I started acting who didn’t try to use me for money or connections. You called me _Verhansol_ , and I swear that was so funny I really had to stop myself from laughing right then and there. You even gave me coffee when I came right before closing, and you let me talk to you like I was your friend.”

“But I _am_  your friend,” Seungkwan says, his heart beating in a staccato rhythm so loud he can barely hear his own words. “I’m your friend, Hansol.”

“I don’t just want to be your friend, though.” Hansol pauses, and he reaches over the seat to take one of Seungkwan’s hands in his. Seungkwan watches as Hansol presses his hand to Seungkwan’s, their palms flat against each other, and Hansol slowly intertwines their fingers together, keeping his eyes downward on their linked hands.

“I had to leave for a long time since we had to finish up post-production editing and stuff. All things considered, I think it was a miracle I was back in a month. I was supposed to stay in New York, actually. My mom wanted me to stay, but I wanted to go back to Korea, to come back to Seoul.” Hansol looks up at Seungkwan again, and his eyes are shining with emotion. “I wanted to come back to find you.”

“That’s what you keep saying, though,” Seungkwan laughs shakily, praying that his words won’t betray him and how nervous he is. His voice comes out higher than he’d expected, and he winces.

“I know I said that probably the second time we met or something, and I’m sorry that you keep hearing it. But I mean it every single time. I only ever really want to come back because of you. Like, I didn’t even notice that my messages didn’t send until I got back here and noticed that my internet connection at the time was just _so shitty_.” It’s Hansol’s turn to let out a shuddering laugh. “The entire time, I thought you were ignoring me, so I tried to forget about you, but then they made me come back here to do the premiere shit, and I thought that I should at least say hi to you one last time.”

“I thought _you_  were ignoring me. I was about ready to bust your door down and demand that you respond to my selcas of the hair that I only got, by the way, because of that stupid bet!” Seungkwan looks down at their hands, and he murmurs, “But I didn’t know where you lived, anyway, so I basically had no other way of contacting you. It was like you were completely gone.”

“Yeah, that’s what my manager said, too. Well, basically, I had a manager here for my Korean activities and stuff, like going on interviews and stuff. It was kind of wild, and a lot of it was super stressful. So whenever it got to be too much, I’d kinda just grab my phone and my cap and my mask and I’d walk out of the hotel that they set me up at. Then I’d start walking, and my feet would always just find themselves on the intersection of these two streets, and it was the corner where you were.” Hansol stops. “I think, in a way, you saved me. It’s so hard being somewhere without your parents, you know? And all of your friends?”

Seungkwan thinks back to the family and the friends he’d left behind in Jeju, and he swallows the lump in his throat. “Yeah,” he says thickly. “Yeah, I know what you mean.”

“I think finding someone as— someone as genuine as you are really kept me from getting super stressed about my job and filming and everything. I was up all day and all night, and sometimes, I just got so tired of listening to everyone telling me ‘Vernon, stand here,’ or ‘Vernon, come back here,’ or ‘Vernon, stop falling asleep in your chair.’ All true stories, by the way.” Hansol sighs. “I guess I should’ve told you who I really was in the beginning, but I didn’t want you to treat me any differently. That’s why I got so weird when your roommates came home that one time. I didn’t want them to recognize me and then tell you, because then I was scared that you would start acting like, I guess, everyone else. Now I know you’re not the kind of person to do that.”

“Hey, hang on. I think you saved me, too,” Seungkwan says abruptly. “I really think you did. Don’t sell yourself short, you’re really funny, and your face isn’t half bad, either. You totally saved me from having to come home to my roommates fighting over who forgot to take out the moldy bread, too. So thanks.”

“Moldy bread?” Hansol’s eyebrows quirk upwards. “They sound like really interesting guys, can I meet them someday? Now that the cat’s out of the bag?”

“Yeah, sure, if you’re fine with them asking you to help them peel potatoes or something. They love free labor.”

“Hey, if it means I get to eat whatever happens to the potatoes after that, I’d say that’s a pretty damn good investment of my time.”

“Are you even good at peeling potatoes? Last I heard, the only thing you’re good at doing is being a spy and throwing briefcases around.” Seungkwan teases, hoping that it’ll get a rise out of Hansol, and he sees a spark light up in Hansol’s eyes when the comment hits home.

“Well, whatever, I can just be a spytato. Verhansol the spytato,” Hansol quips.

They grin at each other, small and tentative at first, before they start laughing. Seungkwan has to let go of Hansol’s hand, which is starting to get a bit clammy and warm anyway, so he can hold his own stomach. Seungkwan doesn’t even notice when the car slows to a stop, and he realizes, with no small amount of disappointment, that he’s back at his own place again.

“I’ll walk you back up,” Hansol offers, and Seungkwan climbs out of the car when Hansol opens the door for him.

Seungkwan’s about to go back upstairs when he realizes there’s something else he has to do first. He turns back to the car, leans down, and waves to Mingyu and Seungcheol in the front seats. “Bye! See you guys sometime soon!”

They wave back to him, grinning wildly, and they mouth something that Seungkwan doesn’t manage to catch but has Hansol reddening again. “Come on, let’s go,” Hansol mutters, walking at a faster pace that Seungkwan has to walk with longer strides to keep up with.

They make their way back up to Seungkwan’s apartment in relative silence, and it’s only when they’re standing outside Seungkwan’s door that they turn to face each other. Seungkwan exhales, and when he looks just slightly upward to meet Hansol’s gaze, the feeling that passes through his entire body is electric.

“Well, I guess this is it,” Seungkwan starts, reaching into his pocket for the keys he’d stashed in there so many hours ago. “I’ll be going now. Thanks for the ride and the premiere and telling me the truth. I really appreciate it.”

Seungkwan is about to turn to unlock his door when Hansol lurches forward and grabs his wrist. “Wait, Seungkwan. I have something to ask you.”

“What is it?”

Hansol leans in, and when Seungkwan thinks he’s about to speak, he wets his lips and swallows. “Seungkwan, I wanted to know if— if you wanted to go on a date with me sometime. A real one.”

This isn’t happening. This isn’t real life. Seungkwan feels like he’s living in a world of his own imagination, but Hansol is right there in front of him, and he’s _real_. There’s just one detail, though, that keeps poking around at the back of Seungkwan’s brain, and he needs to voice it.

“I thought we already had one, though?” Seungkwan wonders, and Hansol’s eyebrows furrow. “We even made a bet during that one, don’t you remember?”

Seungkwan tries not to let the bubble of hope blossoming in his chest get the better of him, but he holds his breath as he watches Hansol’s expression go slack before his face splits in the brightest smile Seungkwan’s seen on him.

“Yeah,” Hansol exhales nearly breathlessly. His smile is apparently contagious, because now Seungkwan can’t stop smiling, and _ow_  his cheeks are starting to hurt. “Yeah, this can be our second one. I’ll text you, yeah?”

“I’ll be waiting,” Seungkwan says. “No backing out this time, okay? No getting up and disappearing for a month again?”

“I swear to you, Seungkwan, I’ll be here. I found a position on a show here, and I think they said some of their variety shows are looking for guest emcees? If you want, we could end up at the same place, and then we’ll be so close that you’ll get sick and tired of me.”

Seungkwan snorts, but that damn grin on his face still won’t go away. “I’d never get tired of you, Hansol. Unless you make me dye my hair again. You’re damn lucky the pink ended up kinda nice, but if you made me have bright neon blue for half a month, you wouldn’t even be here right now.”

Hansol pretends to contemplate it. “Hmm, now there’s a thought,” he says, letting his sentence trail off as Seungkwan gapes at him.

“Seriously!” Seungkwan definitely doesn’t whine. He doesn’t. “Blue will _not_  look good on me! Anyway, just watch, you’re gonna end up with a tattoo that says my name on it before you know it.”

“I can’t wait,” Hansol says solemnly, and his smile turns into something fond. He takes half a step forward, and Seungkwan has just enough time to close his eyes before Hansol’s lips are on his again, warm and pliant. It’s longer than the first one, and it leaves Seungkwan’s legs feeling even shakier when they pull apart. “I’ll see you, Seungkwan.”

Seungkwan leans back in for another quick kiss, tugging Hansol closer and down by his tie. “Get ready to lose the bet next time, Choi,” he declares, and the crooked grin that Hansol gives him in return is worth it.

He doesn’t stop thinking about that smile of Hansol’s the entire night, not even when he’s getting cleaned up and ready for bed, not even when Soonyoung bursts into his room and asks him where he’s been, not even when Seokmin lays on Seungkwan’s legs and pesters him for information. He shoos them out of his room and settles into bed and pulls out his phone, typing _hansol vernon choi_  into the search bar.

Seungkwan doesn’t really care about keeping up with the latest celebrity gossip, but he figures that he can make an exception for Hansol.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i forgot to post this yesterday frick LOL ;;;;; sorry about the late update!!! thank you so much to everyone who followed along and left nice comments; it made me so so happy to see them ^__^ i hope you enjoyed it! much much much love~ [♡](https://static.tumblr.com/fd46a20681269a93b8a48d616d1b6b7d/zbjyaw5/dROojw0ps/tumblr_static_tumblr_static__640.gif)


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